- Lebanon says 100 dead in Israeli strikes on Hezbollah strongholds
- Man City's Akanji sends defiant title message after Arsenal battle
- Madrid's 'many styles' key to unbeaten streak: Ancelotti
- UK's Labour pledges economic rebuild amid free gifts row
- Barca goalkeeper Ter Stegen to undergo knee operation
- French mass rape trial moves on to new defendants
- Israel warns Lebanese as intense strikes target Hezbollah
- UK's Labour looks to be more cheerful despite gifts and welfare row
- Eurozone business activity slumps after Olympics boost
- Russia, Ukraine cross swords in sea dispute court battle
- Albania plans Sufi Muslim microstate within its borders
- EU launches WTO challenge against China dairy probe
- Murdoch's REA ups offer for property website Rightmove
- India's one-horned rhino numbers charging ahead, govt says
- Rescuers comb muddy riverbanks after Japan floods kill seven
- Asian stocks boosted by US rate cut, China stimulus hope
- Sri Lanka's new leader says no magic solution to crisis
- Israel warns Lebanese as wave of strikes hits Hezbollah
- New Socceroos coach Popovic confident he can rescue World Cup campaign
- 'Put Austrians first': On a pub crawl with far-right voters
- Trial begins in Italy student murder case that opened eyes to femicide
- Family of murdered Sri Lanka editor seek justice from new president
- Austria's far right woos anti-vaxxers with fund for vaccine 'victims'
- Long wait for justice in India's backlogged courts
- Rohingya refugees detail worsening violence in Myanmar
- Rescuers comb muddy riverbanks after Japan floods kill six
- Sri Lankan leftist leader sworn in after landslide election win
- Indonesia, NZ deny Papua rebel claim 'bribe' paid for pilot release
- Swearing, shoeys and swift legs: Singapore GP talking points
- South Korea warns of 'decisive' action against trash balloons
- Football Australia names Tony Popovic as Socceroos coach
- Japan quake, flood victim attempts fresh start with wife's memory
- Japan quake, flood victim attemps fresh start with wife's memory
- Asian markets extend gains as focus turns to US inflation
- Six dead after floods in central Japan: media
- Australian golf prodigy suffers career-threatening eye injury
- Gaza hospital a symbol of the ruin of war
- October 7: how Israel's deadliest day unfolded
- Bibles, sneakers, silver coins: Trump's merch for sale
- Met Opera opens season with tech-heavy 'Grounded'
- Colombia's Inirida flower: from 'weed' to emblem for UN meeting
- Colombia rebel group imposes control in restive coca zone
- Rams fight back to upset 49ers, Cowboys lose again
- Sri Lankan leftist leader to take office after landslide election win
- 300-kilo WWI bomb removed in Belgrade
- Zelensky in US to explain war plan to Biden, Harris, Trump
- 'Atrocious' Sudan war pushing refugees further afield: UNHCR chief
- 'Convergence' growing on global plastics treaty: UN environment chief
- MLB White Sox fall to Padres to match one-season loss mark
- All-Australian Ripper squad captures LIV Golf team crown
'Not forgotten': Prisoners prep to vote in French election
When he was sent to prison six months ago, Dylan thought he had lost his civic rights along with his freedom.
So when prison staff woke him up from a nap one day to hand him candidate manifestos for this month's presidential election in France, he was taken aback.
"They knocked at the door, and that's how I found out that I can vote even while in prison," said Dylan whose name has been changed by AFP, along with those of the other prisoners cited in the article.
Dylan is incarcerated in Europe's biggest prison in Fleury-Merogis, south of Paris.
Over recent weeks, staff have been busy helping inmates learn about their right to vote, access information about candidates, fill in the paperwork and join discussion groups about who they would like to see running the country next.
France considers any court decision to disenfranchise convicts to be an additional punishment, which has to be proportional to the severity of the crime.
In several other European countries, prisoners are always allowed to vote, including in Scandinavia, Spain and Ireland.
At the opposite end of the spectrum is Britain, which used to ban all prisoners from voting in any election and made some changes -- notably allowing people released on temporary licence -- to vote in response to a ruling by the European Court of Human Rights.
Of the 777 prisoners in Dylan's D1 cell block, 460 have the right to vote, and 260 have registered.
Now that he knows about his rights, Dylan said he hoped his vote, "however insignificant", will help influence national politics beyond the three-kilometre (two-mile) long prison walls surrounding the 3,600 inmates here.
Another inmate, Amin, leafed through the manifestos, first President Emmanuel Macron's, then that of Socialist candidate Anne Hidalgo, and finally that of Eric Zemmour, a far-right contestant.
"That allows us to compare them," the 49-year-old said.
"You can read them a few times", whereas on television, his main source of news, "you can watch a programme only once".
- 'Not vote blindly' -
Amin, a father of four who is to be released in 2025, said the information campaign "helps us not to vote blindly" and to think of the future, specifically "the environment, and education".
According to prison director Franck Linares, a deprivation of civic rights for convicted criminals is "very rare" in France.
"Inmates remain citizens while in prison, and also after their release," he said.
Helping them vote is part of the prison administration's mission to "integrate and re-integrate" inmates by ensuring that prison time is "not wasted", Linares added.
Amin was given three options to cast his vote in the presidential voting rounds on April 10 and 24: Vote outside the prison by special permission at a regular ballot box, vote by proxy, or -- for the first time in a presidential election -- by postal vote.
"We may be locked up, but this makes us feel like citizens, respected, and not forgotten," Amin said.
Patrick, on his ninth criminal conviction, said he would vote for the first time, at 40.
Zakari, 25, said the idea of voting gave him the feeling of being "a responsible person".
Maxime, 24, arrived too late to register for the postal vote, having been imprisoned only four days earlier.
"What about the legislative election?" in June, asked a social worker, sent by the integration and probation service SPIP, during an information gathering.
"Now you've got me stumped. I don't know what that is," replied Maxime.
Hakim, 20, admitted: "Legislative? I've never even heard that word before."
- 'Secret or not?' -
He only came to the meeting to get out of his cell, Hakim said, but quickly got interested in the democratic process.
"Will our vote remain secret or not?", he asked, and said that the programme of The Republicans, a conservative party, got his attention. "I like what Valerie Pecresse has to say, but... whatever," he says.
But one thing he could never understand, he said: "What does far-right and far-left mean?"
The head of the prison's SPIP office, Emmanuel Gandon, responded: "Our role is to explain how to participate in the vote, not to talk politics."
Visibly frustrated, Hakim said he wouldn't vote because "I don't want to get into something that I don't understand".
But on his way out, he filled in a registration form anyway, just in case.
M.Odermatt--BTB