probe

Bernard Laporte, head of the French rugby federation, was questioned in police custody for a second day on Wednesday over allegations that he and two others placed pressure on the appeals committee of the French league to reduce a disciplinary punishment against rugby club Montpellier.  

The Paris prosecution services on Tuesday opened an investigation into allegations by former world championship bronze medallist Sarah Abitbol that she was raped by her coach when aged between 15 and 17, and those of three other skaters who accused the same coach and two of his colleagues of abuse and rape when they were minors, as pressure grew on the president of France's ice skating federation, Didier Gailhaguet, to resign.

Former socialist presidential election candidate Ségolène Royal, the former partner of François Hollande and who was nominated as France's special ambassador for the Polar Regions by President Emmanuel Macron in 2017, appeared close to being dismissed on Wednesday for her outspoken critism of government policy and after public prosecutors openend a preliminary probe into her alleged misuse of staff and expenses for personal interests.

France's junior ministers for gender equality and child welfare have jointly called for a judicial investigation to be opened into accusations that convicted paedophile and multi-millionaire Jeffrey Epstein, who was found dead in his Manhattan prison cell at the weekend, engaged in criminal sexual activity in France where he owned a property and frequently sojourned. 

A French judicial investigation into claims relayed by the United Nations that several French soldiers engaged in a peacekeeping mission in the Central African Republic perpetrated rape and sexual abuse of minors between 2013 and 2014 has been wound down after magistrates ruled there was insifficient evidence to support a prosecution.

French probe into Alps crash caused by suicidal co-pilot advises doctors inform authorities when a patient's health is likely to affect public safety.