French Prime Minister Jean Castex on Monday announced new measures to stem the rampant progression of the Omicron variant of the coronavirus, including mask-wearing in city centre streets and limits on numbers attending indoor and outdoor gatherings, although no curfews are presently envisaged and schools will reopen as normal in January.
The Domaine Capitaine Danjou, an estate of vinyards and olive groves close to Aix-en-Provence, is home to 80 veterans of the French army's elite Foreign Legion in need of convalescence, rehabilitation or simply a roof over their heads, where they regularly produce around 200,000 bottles of wine per year.
France's top health authority has recommended anti-Covid-19 booster jabs be administered just three months after the last of the standard two vaccinations, down from an initial waiting time of five months, as the country this weekend registered more than 100,000 daily cases of coronavirus infections for the first time since the start of the pandemic.
A zoo in south-west France has temporarily closed after a pack of nine wolves escaped from their enclosure, leading to four of them being shot dead after 'dangerous behaviour'.
As the Christmas weekend approaches, amid official appeals for people to test for the coronavirus before joining in family gatherings, record demand for PCR and antigen tests, which saw more than six million performed in the week between December 13th-19th, has left an estimated two-thirds of chemist's stores out of stock.
A lawyer acting for Brigitte Macron, wife of the French president, has confirmed she is taking legal action over claims circulating on social media, and reportedly prompted by a far-right outlet, that she was a male at birth called Jean-Michel Trogneux.
French European affairs minister Clément Beaune has invited the British government 'to rebuild a climate of trust with France and the EU in the interest of all' following the resignation of London's chief Brexit negotiator David Frost.
French luxury goods group LVMH, whose wayward security service led by former domestic intelligence chief Bernard Squarcini was revealed to have spied on companies and people, including a leftwing documentary maker whose film was sharply critical of LVMH boss Bernard Arnault, has reached a 10 million-euro settlement with Paris prosecutors which effectively ends further legal action against it.
Omar Raddad, a Moroccan national who was found guilty in 1994 of the murder of wealthy heiress Ghislaine Marchal, for whom he worked as a gardener, who received a presidential pardon and who has continued to protest his innocence for more than 25 years, has finally won a lengthy judicial battle to have the case reviewed.
