Social unrest amid complaints about crime, living costs and poor healthcare has paralysed French Guiana for days, shutting down its international airport and forcing the cancellation of the launch of two Arianespace rockets intended to place in orbit communication satellites.
An opinion survey this weekend confirmed centrist French presidential election candidate Emmanuel Macron as frontrunner in both rounds of the voting, while scandal-hit conservative candidate François Fillon, hanging on in third position despite a fall in poll ratings, was met by roudy protestors during a campaign visit to south-west France.
Police said they believed a gangland dispute was behind the wounding of three people, including a teenager, outside an underground railway station in Lille, north-east France, by one or more assailants who fled the scene.
In the first public statement by a member of the family of Germanwings co-pilot Andreas Lubitz, who German prosecutors found solely responsible for crashing his plane in the French Alps killing all 150 people on board in March 2015 because of a depressive condition, caused anger among victms' families by claiming a carbon monoxide leak in the cabin was the cause.
Maverick centrist Emmanuel Macron received a significant boost to his presidential election campaign when defence minister Jean-Yves Le Drian, a veteran Socialist Party figure, announced his support for Macron's candidature in an interview published Friday.
The Chadian security minister said the French civilian, who works for a mining company in Chad where he was kidnapped on Thursday, had been traced to Sudan where 'mixed Chadian and Sudanese forces' are looking for him.
Scandal-hit conservative presidential candidate François Fillon, mired in graft scandals and under investigation for fraud and misusing public funds, claimed that his predicament was the work of a secret plot by socialist president François Hollande, who has firmly dismissed the 'untruthful allegations'.
The French far-right leader and presidential candidate Marine Le Pen met with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Friday, when she also spoke to Russia's lower house, the Duma, when she called for international sanctions against the country to be lifted.
Latest opinion survey shows Emmanuel Macron, the maverick centrist candidate in France's presidential election race, with a lead over far-right Front National leader Marine Le Pen in the first-round vote and confirms a commanding win against her in the knockout second round.
France's foreign minister Jean-Marc Ayrault flew to London on Thursday where he visited three French school pupils who were seriously injured when they were struck by a vehicle driven at high speed into pedestrians crossing Westminster Bridge on Wednesday, in an attack claimed by the Islamic State group.
