Macron

Politicians whom the Gods wish to destroy, they first make ridiculous. On Tuesday evening, as the deaths attributed to Covid-19 reached 50,000, Emmanuel Macron, president of the Republic, again commandeered French television channels to announce his latest strategy to end the national lockdown. He claimed to be making himself perfectly clear as his timetable for ending lockdown was conditioned by the subjunctive. The big give was that from Saturday, we are to be allowed to spend three hours daily outside, and to venture 20km (no more) from our front doors. (This will be a relief to a friend in the Dordogne who was ‘verbalisé’ by the flics last week when

The war of words between Pakistan and France – sparked by president Macron’s comments about radical Islam – rumbles on. But the latest skirmish has led to an embarrassing climbdown from one of Pakistan’s top politicians. ‘Macron is doing to Muslims what the Nazis did to the Jews – Muslim children will get ID numbers (other children won’t) just as Jews were forced to wear the yellow star on their clothing for identification,’ wrote Pakistan’s federal minister for human rights Shireen Mazari. Mazari’s tweet was quickly picked up by those who have suggested there is something sinister to Macron’s recent interventions. But there was a problem: it was nonsense. France soon hit back,

Will the presidency of Emmanuel Macron open the door to a political dynasty in France? He has no children, so that’s a problem. But wait. There’s Brigitte Macron, who has three. Albeit, all from the union she abandoned to marry Emmanuel, her pupil. Meet the youngest of Mme Macron’s three children, Tiphaine Auzière, 36, a lawyer, social entrepreneur, and République En Marche activist. Merely six years younger than Macron himself, Tiphaine is the striking cover girl (alongside her mum, the First Lady of France) of Paris Match magazine this week. And it doesn’t take profound insight to imagine that with important regional elections next year, she’s running for something. At

One of the persistent misconceptions of the riots that swept through France in the autumn of 2005 is that they were solely the result of the deaths of two youths as they ran from the police. The deaths of the teenagers on October 27 in Clichy-Montfermeil provoked unrest in the north-eastern Parisian suburb but it was what happened three days later that led to three weeks of nationwide riots and the declaration of a state of emergency by the then president of France, Jacques Chirac. According to Gilles Kepel in his 2015 book, Terror in France: genesis of the French Jihad, it was a stray tear gas grenade fired by

Is France flirting with the idea of Frexit again? Coronavirus is currently provoking a chorus of ‘reprendre le contrôle’ (take back control) across the political spectrum. The epidemic is laying bare France’s dependence on outside states for essentials such as masks, medicines, test kits and ventilators. Even arch-Europhile Emmanuel Macron visiting a French mask manufacturer declared this week: ‘We have to produce more in France, on our territory, from now on to reduce our dependency… we must rebuild our national and European sovereignty’. His reference to Europe is not unusual, but highlighting national sovereignty is. The second ‘take back control’ stimulant comes from growing irritation with the European Union. Images

On Saturday night France’s Prime Minister spoke to the French people flanked by the Health Minister, the Director General of Health (DGS) and three epidemiologists, to reassure the public that the government would be more transparent about the spread of coronavirus. Despite President Macron’s increasing media appearances in the ‘war on corona’ a 25 March opinion poll showed 90 per cent of the French public are anxious, 39 points more than on 11 March before the lockdown. Although 64 per cent claimed their morale was holding up, 56 per cent said they had lost faith in the executive’s management of the crisis. This is very different to a poll on

As France prepares to enter its third week of confinement the Prime Minister, Edouard Philippe, has warned that ‘the fight has only just begun’. Coronavirus has claimed 2,606 French lives to date, but at a press conference on Saturday evening Philippe said: ‘The first 15 days of April will be even more difficult than the last 15 days.’ Earlier in the week Philippe had praised the resolve of the vast majority for respecting the lockdown, and he urged France to hold the course while announcing that the confinement will continue until at least April 15. ‘This struggle will last,’ he said. ‘We will only win by being disciplined and observing

In France there is a palpable sense of administrative and political panic in how to deal with the coronavirus epidemic. As I write from Perpignan on the French-Spanish border on the morning of 24 March, France has 19,856 coronavirus cases and 860 deaths; Britain 6,650 and 335. After Italy and Spain, France is the third worst affected country in Europe (Germany has more cases because it tests more, but only 123 deaths), but it has imposed and enforced the most severe lockdown. France went into lockdown on 17 March. The administrative state immediately generated an array of bureaucratic forms: a certificate to leave your house to walk the dog or go shopping; a

As the coronavirus pandemic continues to spread across Europe, the United States has reduced its participation in a Nato military exercise that was set to be one of the alliance’s largest since the end of the Cold War. In April and May, the Defender-Europe 20 exercise was meant to feature 37,000 troops from 18 countries, including 20,000 soldiers deployed from the United States. It was planned to take place across ten European countries, with the bulk of the drills in Germany, Poland, and the Baltic states. Shortly after the WHO declared that Europe had become the new ‘epicentre of the pandemic’, the Trump administration enacted a travel ban for foreign visitors from

Looming behind the Frost-Barnier negotiations is a battle between London and Paris as financial centres. After the June 2016 referendum, the French failed miserably to seduce City institutions away from the UK. There was no exodus from London, and of those few relocations to the continent, most avoided Paris, preferring to scatter widely from Dublin to Frankfurt and Amsterdam.  After failing in the first instance, the French will now attempt to do so by force under the cover of the EU negotiations. The strategy of Macron and his ambitious Finance Minister, Bruno Le Maire, will be to ensure Europe does not recognise passporting for British banks, that Euro-denominated transactions are

Emmanuel Macron lost his cool during a walkabout in Jerusalem’s Old City on Tuesday and television cameras captured the moment for posterity. “Everybody knows the rules,” shouted the president of France, directing his wrath at Israeli security officials. “I don’t like what you did in front of me. Go outside!” The confrontation took place outside the Church of Saint Anne, a possession of the French government which is regarded as French territory. According to reports Macron snapped when Israeli security men attempted to accompany him into the church. It’s not the first time that a French president has had a fit of Gallic pique in Jerusalem; Jacques Chirac famously clashed