Author: Raimond Broussard

French police have warned Alpine hikers they will be fined hundreds of euros if they pick too many blooming plants on their summer walks. Officers confiscated thousands of génépi sprigs and edelweiss flowers during a week-long enforcement operation this month. The local authorities said 20 hikers had been given verbal warnings and told they would be fined up to €750 if they broke the regulations again. While not all the mountain plants and flowers are officially protected, conservationists say the destruction of swathes of local flora is putting at risk the diversity of the natural heritage of the Savoie and…

Four people have been arrested in France after the deaths of six men whose boat capsized while crossing the Channel. French judges are considering charges including involuntary manslaughter against the Iraqi and Sudanese suspects, according to reports. At least two of those detained are suspected to have links to human trafficking networks. Last Saturday the six men died after their vessel got into difficulty near Calais. More than 50 other people were rescued by French and British coastguards. The confirmed dead were all Afghan men and were among 65 or 66 male passengers on the craft, most of whom were from Afghanistan. According to…

European conservatism is in crisis. Traditional centre-right parties are increasingly facing challenges from their right by parties with more energy and extreme proposals for addressing the multitude of crises facing the continent. While centre-right parties may not have much in the way of ideas to resolve Europe’s polycrisis, they do still know how to fight for power. Their instinctive drive for self-preservation means conservatives are radicalising, particularly over issues of race, in order to cut off their insurgent rivals. Take France, where the formerly dominant Les Républicains (LR) party has entered a death spiral, with its last presidential candidate, Valerie Pécresse, failing to…

The French far-right leader Marine Le Pen could win the next presidential election in 2027, the interior minister, Gérald Darmanin, has said, as he positions himself as a potential candidate for the centre-right. “The fact of the matter is that in five years’ time, a victory for Madame Le Pen is quite probable,” Darmanin told La Voix du Nord, in an interview published on Friday. Darmanin, 40, who is in charge of French policing, has faced several crises in recent months, including urban unrest after the police shooting of a teenager of Algerian origin at a traffic stop outside Paris in June, and violent gun…

Booksellers in Paris have hit out at plans to “hide” them during the 2024 Olympics, after they were told by local authorities to remove their stalls for the opening ceremony for security reasons. The bouquinistes along the River Seine make up the largest open-air book market in Europe and represent a 400-year-old tradition. However, about 570 of the stalls, which make up about 60% of the total along the river, need to be dismantled and moved, according to city authorities, for the opening ceremony on 26 July next year. Police told the booksellers earlier this week their stalls are within the perimeter of protection…

More than half the journalists at France’s only standalone Sunday newspaper have resigned after failing to prevent the arrival of an editor with far-right ties in a bitter dispute that has fanned fears of a further US-style polarisation of the country’s media. “We didn’t win,” said Antoine Malo, a roving foreign correspondent at the Journal du Dimanche (JDD) and member of its editorial association. “We didn’t stop him, and now there’s a mass exodus. But the bigger fight will go on – from outside.” The mainstream paper’s 100-odd journalists ended a 40-day strike – the longest media strike in France since the 1970s –…

In this potpourri of a book on the Paris Métro, British author Andrew Martin is not so much writing an ode to the Métropolitain as providing rail fanatics with a literary handbook. You don’t need to be familiar with “third-rail electrification” and “the MP73s, third-generation tyred trains” to enjoy the eclectic information and funny anecdotes of this charming book – but it would sometimes help. Perhaps better assembled as a dictionary of the Métro, in the style of the Dictionnaire amoureux series published since 2000 in France by Plon, Martin’s short book will nonetheless give Paris and Métro lovers what they are looking…

Five Marseille police officers have been detained for questioning over the death of a 27-year-old man during rioting in the French city on 1 July. They were among 20 members of the elite Raid (Research, assistance, intervention, dissuasion) tactical unit questioned about injuries to Mohamed Bendriss during national unrest after the police shooting of a teenager in the Paris suburbs on 27 June during a traffic stop. The public prosecutor suggested it was “probable” Bendriss had died after “a violent shock to the thorax caused by a ‘flash-ball’ type projectile”, a controversial police weapon, that caused him to go into…

Central Asia is one of the priority regional directions of China’s foreign policy, with developing land transport links making the region an important mineral resource base. China’s active policy has positive aspects, but also contains potential threats for the Central Asian republics. While in Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan, China has managed to form a deep dependence on investment, in Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan, the PRC is trying to maintain a stable level of its presence. Chinese Mining Interests in Kazakhstan Kazakhstan is a strategically important supplier of uranium. The country’s share of China’s uranium supply is about 65% of China’s total, while…

Frankfurt, Brussels (3/7 – 27) France has been plagued by multiple outbreaks of rioting following mass protests over the death of a teenager at the hands of a police officer last week. The death of Nahel M. (17), teenager of North African descent, has stoked anger among the public at police violence against minorities and exacerbated existing racial tensions in France. Protests have spread beyond the capital city of Paris and its suburban areas, to other major cities, including Lyon, Marseille, Le Havre, Toulouse and Nantes. On Sunday (2/7/2023), a day after Nahel’s funeral in Nanterre, 719 people were arrested…