Georges Loinger, cousin of the famous mime artist and fellow Resistance member Marcel Marceau, who smuggled out of German-occupied France an estimated 350 Jewish children, saving them from possible deportation to death camps, has died at the age of 108.
Nationwide turnout for the seventh weekend of demonstrations in France on Saturday by so-called Yellow Vest protestors calling for improved living conditions for low- and middle-income earners was about a quarter of that the previous weekend, although militants have called for more protests on New Year's Eve.
Navigator Jean-Jacques Savin, who will turn 72 in January – and, he hopes, at sea – has set off west into the North Atlantic from the Canary Islands in a metal barrel which he expects will be carried by ocean currents alone to somewhere in the Caribbean by the end of March.
The French ambassador to Poland, Pierre Levy, has said he was 'shocked' at comments made by Polish foreign minister Jacek Czaputowicz in which he said recent social unrest in France and the slowdown of President Emmanuel Macron's timetable of reforms had made the country 'the sick man of Europe, dragging Europe down'.
In a deal to be completed in early 2019, French concessions and construction giant Vinci has announced it will take a stake of 50.1 percent in the capital of London's Gatwick Airport, Britain's second-busiest hub for passenger traffic, adding to 46 other airports it already operates in Europe.
The French presidency has contacted Emmanuel Macron's disgraced former security aide and deputy cabinet director, Alexandre Benalla, who was fired over revelations he assaulted individuals during May Day marches, to account for his eventual business dealings when employed by the Élysée Palace and warned him over his conduct on recent high-level business trips to Africa.
An online petition backed by Greenpeace and Oxfam calling for legal action against the French state for its alleged inaction over measures to combat climate change has attracted nearly two million signatures.
A Chinese foreign ministry spokeswoman said France's call, along with other Western governments, for Beijing to release two Canadians arrested after Canada detained the chief financial officer of Chinese telecoms giant Huawei as 'strange' and 'very bad in the eyes of the Chinese people'.
French magistrates have closed an investigation into the missile attack in 1994 on a plane carrying then-Rwandan president Juvenal Habyarimana, which sparked the genocide in the East African country in which more than 800,000 people died, citing insufficient evidence against seven named suspects.
British and French sea rescue services intervened in the early hours on Christmas Day to bring to safety at least 40 migrants, including children, attempting to cross the English Channel to England in precarious conditions in five separate boats.
