Search

Reports on the meeting of Spanish prime minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero in Madrid with French president Jacques Chirac and German chancellor Gerhard Schroder. View that the meeting marked Spain's return to a more European-oriented foreign policy after Zapatero's predecessor turned Spain into an ally of the United States in the Iraq war; Issues discussed, including the European Union's Constitution and its next budget round.

The article reports that the architect who oversaw the design of the fire safety system at the Notre-Dame cathedral in Paris, France noted that officials had misjudged how quickly a flame would ignite and spread through the structure. Topics discussed include description of the system, the lack of proper fire protection in place and impact of delay in notification.

The article discusses that the October's knife slayings by freelance terrorists shocked the French but have not led to the global outpouring of sympathy for France seen after Islamist massacres in 2015 and 2016. it mentions that the European leaders have expressed solidarity, but the Muslim world has been convulsed with anti-French demonstrations and calls for a boycott.

The article discusses problems with the French intelligence service's surveillance methods that were brought to attention after it was revealed that France stopped monitoring Islamist terrorists Saïd Kouachi and Chérif Kouachi prior to their attack on the offices of satirical newspaper "Charlie Hebdo." Topics addressed include a lack of consensus on how to balance counterterrorism surveillance measures with privacy concerns, as well as intelligence on Chérif Kouachi's time spent in Yemen.

The article discusses the implications of a terrorist attack on the offices of French satirical newspaper "Charlie Hebdo," noting that the attack could lead to increasing anti-Islamic sentiments throughout Europe. Topics addressed include anti-immigrant and anti-Muslim sentiment within far-right conservative political parties in Europe, as well as the National Front nationalist French political party.

The article focuses on the easy path of jihadists between Syria and Europe, including the connection of Belgian jihadist Abdelhamid Abaaoud with attackers in Paris, France. Topics include the number of French citizens and Germans believed to have joined the terrorist group Islamic State, mobilization of volunteer army of Sunni fighters by Islamic State, and terrorist Salah Abdeslam.

The article focuses on the leadership of the business community in France. This small group is very homogeneous, drawn from the graduates of two small schools, the Ecole Polytechnique and ENA. French chief executive officers (CEOs) enjoy more power than their U.S. counterparts. The scandal at the bank Societe Generale created by rogue trader Jerome Kerviel, and the lack of blame assumed by its CEO Daniel Bouton have renewed criticism the leaders put themselves above their firms.

The article focuses on mistakes made by the management of the French bank Societe Generale which allowed employee Jerome Kerviel to create unauthorized and ficticious stock trades which cost the firm over $7 billion. The bank ignored messages of warnings from the Eurex financial exchange. It is said to have encouraged a culture of risk-taking which allowed supervisors to ignore Kerviel's methods as long as they seemed profitable.

The article reports that a study by French finance minister Christine Lagarde will suggest tighter risk-control measures at Societe Generale and other French banks in the wake of the $7.2 losses at Societe Generale created by unauthorized stock trades by employee Jerome Kerviel. The report instructs banking regulators to focus their investigation of the fraud into areas where the bank's control system was found inadequate.

The article reports that the board of directors of the French bank Societe Generale took no action on the offer to resign made by Chief Executive Officer Daniel Bouton, leaving him in his position. Anonymous sources indicated this decision may be a temporary one. Bouton is under pressure to resign due to the $7 billion in losses created though the fictitious stock trades of bank traded Jerome Kerviel.

The article reports that several French politicians, including President Nicolas Sarkozy have indicated they wish Daniel Bouton to resign as Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the bank Societe Generale. This was in reaction to the scandal in which bank employee Jerome Kerviel created $7 billion in losses due to fictitious stock trades. An unnamed member of the bank's board of directors said that political pressure to remove Bouton was very strong.

The article reports that the French bank Societe Generale is under increased scrutiny regarding the undocumented stock trades by former employee Jerome Kerviel that resulted in over $7 billion in losses. Kerviel told prosecutors his fictitious trades began in 2005, a year earlier than the bank had stated. This raised questions as to how Kerviel operated without detection. There have been calls for the bank's Chief Executive Officer, Daniel Bouton, to resign.

The article discusses controversial remarks on Iran by French President Jacques Chirac that are to be published February 1, 2007, in "Le Nouvel Observateur." Chirac said that a nuclear-armed Iran would not pose a great danger. France joined the U.S. and other nations in moving to punish Iran for refusing to halt enriching uranium, as demanded by the International Atomic Energy Commission and the United Nations Security Council. INSET: France Tells U.S. to Sign Climate Pacts Or Face Tax.

Reports on the French government's plans to retain crucial industries in the country. Initiative being considered by the France on the European Union level; Government proposals to improve the competitiveness of French companies; Concerns over the departure of industries from Europe.

PARIS -- President Nicolas Sarkozy of France was rubbing shoulders with voters Thursday when one of them literally grabbed his, violently yanking his suit collar, and would have been pulled to the ground had it not been for a metal barricade that caught his fall. The exact motives of the assailant, who the police say was unarmed, remain unclear. But his ability to get so close to France's head of state and physically assault him, before being tackled by security guards seconds later and detained, may raise concerns about presidential security just as the campaigning for the 2012 election gets under way. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

PARIS -- The French finance minister, Christine Lagarde, was on a panel at the World Economic Forum in Davos this January when her usual smile turned into a frown. Next to her, Robert E. Diamond Jr., chief executive of Barclays and one of the most powerful bankers in the world, thanked regulators and finance ministers for their role in shaping a better environment after the financial crisis. Ms. Lagarde looked him in the eye. ''The best way for the banking sector to say thank you would be to actually have, you know, good financing of the economy, sensible compensation systems in place and reinforcement of their capital,'' she replied, to a burst of applause. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

PARIS -- With its presumptive presidential candidate in a New York jail awaiting resolution of sexual assault charges, including attempted rape, the Socialist Party moved on Tuesday to try to reassure its troops, while President Nicolas Sarkozy was reported to have told his party's legislators that the arrest of Dominique Strauss-Kahn was a disaster for the Socialists, who had lost ''the moral part of the battle for the presidency.'' France's political world began maneuvering in earnest on Tuesday. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

CORRECTION APPENDED PARIS -- The arrest in New York of one of France's leading global figures and a possible next president, Dominique Strauss-Kahn, on charges of attempted rape produced an earthquake of shock, outrage, disbelief and embarrassment throughout France on Sunday. The country woke up to the tawdry allegations that Mr. Strauss-Kahn, 62, a leading Socialist and the managing director of the International Monetary Fund, had waylaid and tried to rape a maid in a $3,000-a-night suite at a New York hotel, and the reverberations were immediate. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

PARIS -- Although France has avoided most of the global anti-nuclear backlash prompted by the Fukushima reactor crisis, there is a serious, if quiet, reassessing of the risks here in a country that obtains nearly 80 percent of its electricity from nuclear power. Even though there is little talk about shifting away from the industry, comments this week by top French officials made it clear that there would be changes here that were likely to have an effect on the worldwide reckoning with nuclear power, given France's long history with the industry. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

PARIS -- Tensions between France and Mexico over the case of a Frenchwoman serving a 60-year prison sentence in Mexico City boiled over this week, complicating relations just as a symbolic yearlong celebration of friendship has gotten under way. The implications potentially go far beyond a cultural festival. France, which currently presides over the Group of 20 advanced and emerging economies, is due to pass the baton to Mexico in November. Until then, France has ambitious plans for financial reforms and is hoping for Mexican support. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

6:35 p.m. Updated DAVOS, Switzerland -- Jamie Dimon, chief executive of JPMorgan Chase, lived up to his reputation as a fierce defender of his profession on Thursday when he told listeners in Davos, including the president of France, that he was fed up with banker bashing. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

PARIS -- Amid ongoing fuel shortages and threats of more strikes this week and next, the French government warned Monday that protests against its pension bill were costing the country billions and were damaging its reputation. There were some signs of easing as a 12-day school vacation got under way. Labor unions at three of France's 12 refineries voted to end a walkout, days after the Senate had approved President Nicolas Sarkozy's plans to raise the minimum pension age to 62 from 60. Train lines were operating at almost normal capacity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

PARIS -- Could there be anything more French than this workout? Weeks after giving birth, French women are offered a state-paid, extended course of vaginal gymnastics, complete with personal trainer, electric stimulation devices and computer games that reward particularly nimble squeezing. The aim, said Agnes de Marsac, a physiotherapist who runs such sessions: ''Making love again soon and making more babies.'' [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

PARIS -- Lawmakers in France's lower house on Wednesday passed President Nicolas Sarkozy's pension overhaul, which includes an increase of the minimum retirement age to 62 from 60, after several days of political cross-fire that ended with a raucous overnight debate. As protesters converged across the River Seine from the National Assembly building, the lawmakers voted 329-233 to approve the bill, clearing a first important legislative hurdle. The upper chamber, the Senate, will begin its debate on Oct. 1. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

PARIS -- In blunt language, the European Commission on Tuesday called France's deportation of Roma a ''disgrace'' and threatened legal action against the French government, claiming that it had misled European officials and that it was breaking European law. President Nicolas Sarkozy, who faces record low approval ratings at home, has called Roma camps a source of crime and prostitution. Over the summer, his government expelled about 1,000 Roma, also known as Gypsies, in a move criticized by human rights groups and the Socialist opposition. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

PARIS -- President Nicolas Sarkozy of France was officially drawn into a growing scandal on Wednesday after prosecutors opened a preliminary investigation into allegations that the richest woman in the country made an illegal cash donation to his 2007 election campaign. It is the latest twist in a slow-burning scandal whose daily trickle of ever more startling revelations has drawn close to the center of French power. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

PARIS -- It took Jerome Kerviel, the celebrity rogue trader who stands accused of losing billions of euros at the French bank Societe Generale, 10 minutes to make it through the scrum of microphones and journalists outside a courtroom Tuesday. The media onslaught on the first day of the opening hearing of his long-awaited trial -- a three-week marathon of cross-examinations and expert hearings -- set the stage for a national event with running commentary on topics as diverse as the body language of the lawyers (celebrities in their own right) to the color of the stripes in Mr. Kerviel's tie (pink). [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

PARIS -- A few weeks after Lehman Brothers went bankrupt and the world plunged into a financial crisis, Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany offered some common-sense advice to reckless bankers, indebted consumers and profligate governments. ''One should simply have asked a Swabian housewife,'' Mrs. Merkel said during an address to fellow Christian Democrats in December 2008 in the southwest German region of Swabia, hub of the Protestant work ethic. ''She would have told us her worldly wisdom: in the long run, you can't live beyond your means.'' [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

PARIS -- The governing party of President Nicolas Sarkozy appeared to be beaten by the opposition Socialists on Sunday in a first round of regional elections marked by a record abstention, according to partial official results released Sunday night. The results point to a resounding defeat for the center-right in the final round next Sunday, the last nationwide vote before presidential elections in 2012. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

PARIS -- President Nicolas Sarkozy's governing party is bracing for a crushing defeat in regional elections this Sunday and next, as voters appear determined to use the last nationwide ballot before the 2012 presidential election to send a sharp warning to the Elysee Palace. Most opinion polls suggest that the opposition Socialist Party and its allies are headed for a clean sweep of the 22 regional councils in mainland France in the two-round contest. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

France moved a step closer Thursday to issuing billions of euros in bonds to raise money to promote growth industries, even as a leading research group warned it could damage the country's long-term fiscal future. Two former prime ministers, commissioned by President Nicolas Sarkozy to study the most promising areas of investment, submitted proposals for a total of 35 billion euros ($52 billion) in new state spending. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

A Paris court on Tuesday handed a prison sentence to a former interior minister, Charles Pasqua, and a heavy fine to the son of former President Francois Mitterrand for their involvement in illegal arms trafficking to Angola in the 1990s. Mr. Pasqua, who was interior minister from 1986 to 1988, was sentenced to three years in prison, two of them suspended, and fined about $150,000, for taking commissions on sales to the Angolan Army in violation of a United Nations arms embargo. Jean-Christophe Mitterrand, once his father's adviser on Africa affairs, was convicted of taking more than $2 million in payments and fined $562,000 and given a two-year suspended jail sentence. The masterminds of the sales, a French arms dealer, Pierre Falcone, and a Russian-Israeli billionaire, Arcadi Gaydamak, were each sentenced to six years in prison, although Mr. Gaydamak is at large. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

A package of dynamite planted in a luxury Paris department store was found and removed by the police on Tuesday, rattling the nerves of Parisians at the height of the Christmas shopping season. The store, Printemps, on the elegant Boulevard Haussmann, was just beginning to fill up with shoppers at 11 a.m. on Tuesday when the police swooped in, acting on a tip from a French news agency. They discovered five sticks of dynamite bound together with a cord in a restroom on the third floor of the men's store. There was no detonator with the dynamite, French officials said. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

France will spend 26 billion euros, or $33 billion, over the next two years to soften the blow of the global downturn and limit the effects of increasing unemployment, President Nicolas Sarkozy said Thursday. The plan, worth about 1.3 percent of gross domestic product, is intended to add 0.8 percentage points to growth next year, officials said. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

President Nicolas Sarkozy of France and Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany met on Monday to work out a coordinated response to Europe's deepening recession. But when it came to specifics, they agreed only on what they did not want: to do what Britain did and cut the sales tax. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

France's Socialist Party found itself deeply divided on Sunday and, even worse, harshly mocked. A summer of embarrassing rivalries has culminated in an excruciatingly narrow and disputed vote for a new party leader that is likely to please chiefly the country's center-right president, Nicolas Sarkozy. The Socialists are known for their intellectual disputes; part of the leadership race involved a vote on political platforms written or supported by the various candidates. But much worse for the party, it is now being ridiculed for its personal enmities and rivalries, making it seem less a serious political alternative than an afternoon soap opera. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Vowing to protect French industry from foreign predators and a worsening economic slump, President Nicolas Sarkozy introduced a strategic investment fund of 20 billion euros ($25 billion) on Thursday. He also announced its first investment and promised a stimulus package in coming weeks with the aim of investing extensively in infrastructure, education and research, and hinted that the auto industry might get a helping hand. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Dominique de Villepin, left, a former prime minister of France, faces criminal charges of complicity in a supposed smear campaign against Nicolas Sarkozy before he was elected president, a judicial official said Wednesday. Investigating judges ordered Mr. de Villepin and four other defendants on Tuesday to stand trial in a four-year-old scandal known as the Clearstream affair. Mr. de Villepin has denied the charges. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Former Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin of France faces criminal charges of complicity in an alleged smear campaign that singled out Nicolas Sarkozy before he was elected president, a judicial official confirmed Wednesday. Investigating judges ordered Mr. Villepin and four other defendants on Tuesday to stand trial in a four-year-old scandal known here as the Clearstream affair. If convicted, he could face up to five years in prison. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

President Nicolas Sarkozy of France left the summit meeting on the financial crisis here last weekend in a triumphal mood, declaring that it had tamed the animal spirits of American capitalism. Then he went home and announced that he would hold his own summit meeting in a few weeks in Paris -- on the same topic. That has raised hackles in diplomatic circles, not just because the meeting appears to compete with a planned gathering of 20 world leaders next April. Mr. Sarkozy's aggressive statements have put American officials on edge, with some saying that he seemed determined to turn the global crisis into a referendum on the ills of untrammeled capitalism. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

France's squabbling Socialist Party failed to agree on a leader or a platform over the weekend at a closely watched party congress that was supposed to revive the country's main opposition force as a serious challenger to President Nicolas Sarkozy's administration. The three-day congress in the northern city of Reims had been described as a first step to position the left to win back the Elysee Palace after suffering three consecutive presidential defeats. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The French are literally poking fun at President Nicolas Sarkozy, but he is not amused. On Wednesday, a court threw out a lawsuit that the president filed last week seeking to prevent a voodoo doll made in his image from remaining on sale. Mr. Sarkozy decided to appeal the decision, drawing ridicule from his critics on Thursday. It is his sixth lawsuit this year. The doll, which went on sale on Oct. 9, became a best-selling cult item as soon as the president tried to have it banned; it comes with 12 pins and a manual explaining how to put a curse on him. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

One Taliban fighter is clad in the bulletproof vest of a dead French soldier. Another shows off a French walkie-talkie. Yet another wears a camouflage French Army helmet. These are among the photos in a glossy six-page spread published Thursday by the weekly magazine Paris Match that features a group of insurgents who say they killed 10 French soldiers in Afghanistan on Aug. 18. The spread, which has reinforced unease about France's military presence there, is part of the Taliban's media strategy to undercut support for a war that is already unpopular in several NATO countries that have troops in Afghanistan. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

France sought Wednesday to unite the 26 other nations in the European Union behind the accord brokered with Russia to end the war in Georgia, urging that monitors be dispatched to the Caucasus to help uphold the truce between Georgian and Russian forces. The sudden eruption of war in Georgia last week bared divisions within Europe over a resurgent Russia and Georgia's pursuit of NATO membership. Georgia has cast itself as engaged in a lonely struggle to maintain democracy in Russia's backyard. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

When Faiza Silmi applied for French citizenship, she worried that her French was not quite good enough or that her Moroccan upbringing would pose a problem. ''I would never have imagined that they would turn me down because of what I choose to wear,'' Ms. Silmi said, her hazel eyes looking out of the narrow slit in her niqab, an Islamic facial veil that is among three flowing layers of turquoise, blue and black that cover her body from head to toe. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

President Bashar al-Assad of Syria was a guest of honor at France's annual Bastille Day parade here on Monday, a day after he attended the inaugural meeting of a new Mediterranean-oriented association in a sign that his diplomatic isolation is ending but one that angered many because of Syria's links to Iran and militant groups. The parade capped off the inauguration on Sunday of President Nicolas Sarkozy's Union for the Mediterranean, which aims to bring closer together the countries of the European Union and the North African and Middle Eastern nations that ring the sea. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The chief of staff of the French Army, Gen. Bruno Cuche, resigned two days after a soldier from one of the army's top units fired bullets instead of blanks during a military exhibition, wounding at least 16 people. Eleven soldiers were carrying out a mock hostage rescue before an audience of relatives and the public at Laperrine military barracks on Sunday, but one had confused a magazine containing bullets with one containing blanks, according to the state prosecutor, Brice Robin. Among the questions being raised was whether anyone had inspected the magazines of the participating soldiers. The soldier who fired the bullets, a 28-year-old sergeant, has been suspended and faces charges of involuntarily causing bodily harm. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

A prosecutor said that a French soldier did not act deliberately when he used live ammunition during a mock antiterrorist exercise on Sunday before an audience of mostly military spouses and children in southern France. Seventeen people were wounded, four of them critically, including a 3-year-old. The soldier, a sergeant who was not identified, was arrested and was being questioned. ''This act was absolutely not premeditated,'' said Brice Robin, the state prosecutor in Montpellier. Mr. Robin said he would ask that the sergeant be charged with involuntary bodily harm. If any of the wounded die, the charge could become involuntary manslaughter. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]