Christophe de Margerie

The oil giant's former chief executive officer Thierry Desmarest returns as chairman, helping new CEO Patrick Pouyanne ease into his job.

Federal investigators said the driver of a snow plough hit by Christophe de Margerie's jet was drunk, and also blamed airport's management.

The boss of French oil and gas giant Total, 63, and the three crew of his Falcon 50 executive jet died after it hit a snow plough on takeoff.

France-based businessman and arms dealer Ziad Takieddine is a key witness in an ongoing French judicial probe into suspected illegal party financing through commissions paid in a major French weapons sale to Pakistan. In a series of investigations that began in July, Mediapart has revealed how Takieddine has long served as a secret diplomatic and business emissary for the staff of Nicolas Sarkozy - before and after he became French president. Here, Fabrice Arfi and Karl Laske unravel how Takieddine, backed by Sarkozy's Elysée Palace chief-of-staff, was paid almost 7 million euros by oil group Total in a gas field deal with the regime of Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi.