Keyword: paris

In 1954, US novelist John Steinbeck, author of The Grapes of Wrath, Of Mice and Men and East of Eden, sojourned in Paris, when he wrote a short story published in the daily Le Figaro and which was re-published for the first time in English this week under the title The Amiable Fleas, but evidence suggests that during his stay in the French capital Steinbeck may also have been gathering intelligence for the CIA.

Stalingrad Connection, named after a Paris metro station where homeless migrants once set up a makeshift camp for shelter, broadcasts in five languages to keep asylum seekers in contact with each other, to report on their experiences and to provide practical information.

Venezuelan artist Carlos Cruz-Diez, regarded as one of Latin America’s most prominent artists in the second half of the 20th century, and who pioneered kinetic art in which perceived movement is one of its key effects, has died at his home in Paris, aged 95.

A temperature of 42.6°C was registered in Paris on Thursday, beating a previous record high of 40.4°C in 1947, as most of France bore the brunt of a massive heatwave blanketing western Europe this week and which is due to begin diminishing on Friday. 

The prefecture for the Paris region together with the local water supply company have dismissed as 'fake news' rumours circulating on social media that drinking water in the French capital is contaminated by dangerous levels of the radioactive isotope tritium.

Far-right Italian interior minister Matteo Salvini has declined to take part in a meeting of his European counterparts in Paris on Monday aimed at defining a common policy towards relocation and repatriation of migrants arriving on the continent in clandestine crossings of the Mediterranean, arguing that France and Germany are ignoring 'the demands of the most-exposed countries like us and Malta'. 

A total of 282 people were arrested across the country, 249 of whom were placed in police custody, the interior ministry said on Monday.

A group of hundreds of mostly West Afican migrants stormed the Panthéon mausoleum in the Paris Latin Quarter on Friday to demand that the government review their status as illegal residents unable to obtain recognised rights to work and live in France.

Notre-Dame cathedral after the fire in April 2019. © Reuters

Levels of lead concentration 400 to 700 times the maximum authorised limit have been detected in the ground inside and around Notre-Dame cathedral in Paris since the fire that destroyed it in April, according to confidential documents seen by Mediapart. Neither the regional health authority nor the Paris police authorities – who have carried out one of the tests - have passed on these results to people living near by or people working in contaminated areas. One reason for not doing so is apparently the fear of alarming people. Pascale Pascariello reports.

Contingency plans by Paris city hall for a record-breaking June heatwave this week, when temperatures are expected to reach around 40° Celsius, include overnight access to the capital's parks, late-night openings for swimming pools, and cool-off rooms in public buildings. 

Mayor Anne Hidalgo said there had been serious injuries and many near-misses across city due to trend for the new fashionable travel device.

A Paris court will next week try in absentia Ian Bailey, 62, a British expatriate living in west Cork, Ireland, who is accused of the 1996 murder there of French filmmaker Sophie Toscan du Plantier which Bailey denies committing but says he will 'almost certainly' be convicted of.  

A meeting in Paris on Wednesday between social media companies and leaders from several governments, as well as officials from the EU, will hear a demand from France and New Zealand that the tech firms do more to remove violent content from appearing online.    

A police commissariat in north-east Paris has been forced to close public access to its building because of an invasion over recent weeks of fleas which police staff unions say have bitten a number of officers.

Around 15,000 rental scooters have flooded Paris since introduction last year with the number expected to rise to 40,000 by the end of this year.