A letter signed by 23 retired French generals, who warn that the military might have to “intervene” in a “civil war” because of a failure by the French state to crack down on “Islamists”, has caused a political row. Defence minister Florence Parly has warned of “consequences” for any active soldiers on the list of signatories, which includes scores of other senior ranks. Meanwhile Marine Le Pen, the president of the far-right Rassemblement National (RN) party, has given the retired generals her support. As Lucie Delaporte reports, her backing for such views is a stark reminder of what the RN really stands for, after a decade in which Le Pen has sought to soften the party's image.
France’s foreign aid agency, the AFD, which provides financial support for developing countries, funds projects in Africa to the tune of billions of euros in contracts in which the principal beneficiaries are French companies, while the details of a number of its activities are not made public for reasons of banking secrecy. Justine Brabant and Anthony Fouchard summarize here the findings of a series of investigations into the AFD's practices by Mediapart in partnership with online newsroom Disclose.
The murder of a policewoman at Rambouillet, south west of Paris, on Friday April 23rd brought to 12 the number of members of the police and security forces who have been killed in terrorist attacks in France since 2015. Overall, attacks targeting police officers have grown in number over that period. This “French exception” is a phenomenon which has become more prevalent since the collapse of Islamic State's self-styled 'Caliphate' in the Middle East. Matthieu Suc reports.
Documents seen by Mediapart reveal that some students at the school where France's future judges and prosecutors are trained used racist language on a private online document. The comments made by the students, who are poised to graduate from the École Nationale de la Magistrature and start their careers, include “France for the French” and “Arabs Out”. The college's authorities informed prosecutors in Bordeaux who have now opened a criminal investigation. David Perrotin reports.
An investigation by Mediapart has revealed a pattern of anti-Roma insults, sexist behaviour and prejudice towards residents of a high-immigration area among certain staff at an organisation helping to deliver the 2024 Paris Olympic Games. After Mediapart raised the issue with management three employees at SOLIDEO – the body overseeing construction of the Games infrastructure - have been suspended and an internal inquiry has been established. Previous attempts to raise the issue internally, including the referral of complaints to the office of Paris mayor Anne Hidalgo, apparently had little effect. Jade Lindgaard and Antton Rouget report.
While France last week passed the landmark official figure of 100,000 deaths from Covid-19, some have questioned the real significance of the disease on the deathrate of the elderly and the physically weak who, they bluntly argue, would have died sooner or later from other causes. Rozenn Le Saint turned to demographers for their insight into a clouded debate.
Earlier this year, a young Guinean apprentice baker in Besançon, eastern France, who arrived in the country as an unaccompanied minor, received a deportation order immediately after he turned 18. His outraged employer went on hunger strike in protest, and the order was finally overturned. Now another young Guinean, Yaya Camara, a 19-year-old apprentice electrician also settled in Besançon, has similarly been handed an expulsion order, which he has appealed with the support of his employers and teachers. But a particularly cruel twist in the case is the bizarre and disproven accusations levelled against the teenager by prefecture officials. David Perrotin reports.
In 2016 France and India signed a 7.8-billion-euro deal for the purchase of 36 Rafale jet fighters made by French defence group Dassault. Mediapart can reveal that, alongside this controversial deal, Dassault also agreed to pay one million euros to a middleman who is now under investigation in India in connection with another defence deal. The French anti-corruption agency Agence Française Anticorruption (AFA) discovered this separate arrangement during a routine audit of Dassault. The AFA nonetheless decided not to alert the prosecution authorities over the payment. This is the first part of Mediapart's investigation into a state scandal which also raises questions over the both the justice system and the political authorities. Yann Philippin reports.
Since the Parliamentary elections held in 2017 around 30 Members of Parliament have deserted the ranks of Emmanuel Macron's ruling La République en Marche party. Some have joined other movements, a few have set up their own groups while others simply sit as independents. A year before the next presidential and Parliamentary elections, Mediapart's Ellen Salvi talked to some of these MPs about why they supported Emmanuel Macron in 2017 but are not prepared to do so in 2022.
The number of Covid cases found in French schools, week by week.
There has been exponential growth in the number of Covid-19 cases in French schools, both among pupils and staff, and some teaching personnel have become seriously ill as a result. Though the education minister has just announced a further toughening of the health protocols to tackle the virus in schools, some teachers fear the ministry is still “in denial” over the scale of the problem they are facing. One teaching union is now calling on members to take strike action. Ismaël Bine and Caroline Coq-Chodorge report.
