In an extraordinary move, American tech giant Apple this week applied before a Paris court for a three-year ban to be imposed on alter-globalisation group ATTAC from continuing with its recent demonstrations at the company’s stores in France in a campaign to denounce its tax-dodging practices. Mediapart economics and business correspondent Martine Orange was in court to follow the hearing which, she reports here, has above all served to further tarnish the iPhone maker's image.
Meeting in New Delhi on Friday, Indian defence minister Nirmala Sitharaman and he French counterpart Florence Parly agreed to increase anti-terrorism cooperation defence ties, including greater industrial and research involvement by India in French weapons sales to the country, notably in an expected second order of Dassault Rafale fighter jets.
Air France pilots have approved a plan by the airline to launch a sub-brand called 'Boost' this September, which will offer long- and short-haul services that are cheaper than the parent carrier in an effort to counter competition from Gulf airlines and budget services by Lufthansa and British Airways.
For a long time French overseas territories have been spared armed jihadism and the phenomenon of young people heading off for the war zones of Syria and Iraq. But the recent trial in Paris of a young man from La Réunion in the Indian Ocean for a conspiracy to carry out a terrorist act has changed that. The conviction of Naïl Varatchia also challenges the widely-perceived idea that the Muslim community on the island is an example of tolerance. Julien Sartre reports.
With elections afoot in both their countries, French President Emmanuel Macron and British Prime Minister Theresa May each claim to lead the world's fifth-largest economic power, and the plain facts demonstrate that the two economies have very similar performance in a number of areas.
Conservative presidential candidate François Fillon's campaign has met with a further setback after the Paris prosecutor's office decided on Friday to hand its preliminary investigation into his suspected misuse of public funds by employing his wife and children as parliamentary aides, for work allegedly never carried out, to a powerful judicial investigation.
