- 'Curious' Dupont eyes position change after claiming Top 14 award
- Man Utd stadium regeneration could add £7.3bn to British economy
- At COP16, Colombia seeks to lead by example on biodiversity
- Dupont caps off Olympic gold season with Top 14 player award
- Leeds to expand Elland Road to 53,000 capacity
- Mysterious 18th century diamond necklace set for auction
- World's oceans near critical acidification level: report
- California sues oil giant Exxon over plastic recycling 'myth'
- As wars rage, UN's critics say global body is failing its mission
- Amazon forest has lost an area the size of Germany and France
- Nadal, Alcaraz and Sinner in Davis Cup finals teams
- Telegram's Durov announces new crackdown on illegal content
- African players in Europe: Ice-cool Jackson strikes twice
- Man City's Rodri 'out for season' after ACL injury: reports
- Venezuelan court issues arrest warrant for Argentina's Milei
- Arsenal not yet a match for Man City-Liverpool rivalry, says Silva
- Iran's new president calls Israel warmonger as he seeks talks with West
- Berlin warns UniCredit against Commerzbank takeover attempt
- Black Eyed Peas star harnesses AI for novel radio product
- England cricket captain Knight reprimanded over 'blackface' photo
- Barca goalkeeper Ter Stegen set to miss season after knee operation
- 'I lived a lie', tearful witness tells French mass rape trial
- 274 dead in Israeli strikes on Hezbollah strongholds in Lebanon
- Gunman revealed Trump plot months before golf course arrest: DOJ
- Trial opens in Italy student murder case that opened eyes to femicide
- Iran president accuses Israel of seeking conflict, says opposes war
- Swedish battery maker Northvolt to slash 1,600 jobs, quarter of staff
- Joshua says boxing career 'far from over' after Dubois defeat
- Stock markets inch higher on rate hopes
- 182 dead in Israeli strikes on Hezbollah strongholds in Lebanon
- Friedkin Group reach deal to buy Everton
- UniCredit ups stake in Commerzbank to 21 percent
- Big rate cut was 'appropriate' first step: Fed official
- Stock markets diverge as eurozone economy struggles
- 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
CMSC | -0.32% | 25.07 | $ | |
BCE | 0.17% | 35.1 | $ | |
SCS | 0.73% | 13.015 | $ | |
CMSD | -0.06% | 25.005 | $ | |
RBGPF | 3.11% | 58.83 | $ | |
JRI | -0.23% | 13.29 | $ | |
NGG | 1.28% | 70.455 | $ | |
GSK | 0.13% | 40.855 | $ | |
RIO | 1.56% | 64.575 | $ | |
BCC | 3.01% | 141.76 | $ | |
RYCEF | 1.56% | 7.06 | $ | |
AZN | -1.61% | 77.14 | $ | |
VOD | 0.99% | 10.11 | $ | |
BTI | 1.2% | 37.895 | $ | |
BP | 0.65% | 32.855 | $ | |
RELX | 1.75% | 48.845 | $ |
Le Pen vows headscarf fines in tight French election battle
French far-right presidential candidate Marine Le Pen vowed Thursday to issue fines to Muslims who wear headscarves in public, as candidates made a final push for votes three days ahead of an election seen as increasingly close.
President Emmanuel Macron built what seemed an unassailable lead ahead of the first round of polls Sunday but Le Pen has eroded the margin and feels she has a real chance of winning the run-off on April 24.
With France's traditional right- and left-wing parties facing electoral disaster, far-left candidate Jean-Luc Melenchon is on course to come third and he still believes he can sneak into a run-off.
Speaking to RTL radio, Le Pen explained how her pledge to ban the headscarf in all public spaces would be implemented, saying it would be enforced by police in the same way as seatbelt-wearing in cars.
"People will be given a fine in the same way that it is illegal to not wear your seat belt. It seems to me that the police are very much able to enforce this measure," she said.
Le Pen has said she will use referendums to try to avoid constitutional challenges to many of her proposed laws on the basis that they are discriminatory and an infringement on personal freedoms.
Previous legislation in France banning obvious religious symbols in schools or full-face coverings in public was allowed on the basis that it applied to all citizens and in specific settings.
Le Pen, 53, has toned down her anti-immigration rhetoric during campaigning this year and has focused instead on household spending, putting her closer than ever to power, polls indicate.
The latest surveys suggest she is within striking distance of centrist Macron if the two of them come top in the first round of voting on Sunday.
A second round run-off is scheduled for April 24, with an average of polls indicating Macron has a slight lead of 54 percent versus 46 percent for Le Pen.
Melenchon is also rising strongly ahead of voting and is talking up his chances of springing a surprise.
The war in Ukraine as well as strains on the health system after two years of Covid-19 are high among voter concerns, behind the biggest priority: inflation and incomes.
- Final rallies -
Le Pen is to hold her last campaign rally on Thursday evening in the southern stronghold of Perpignan where her National Rally party has long had strong support and runs the local council.
The slogan "Vote!" underlines the priority for Le Pen in encouraging supporters to turn out on Sunday after high abstention rates resulted in a disappointing result for her in regional elections last June.
Greens candidate Yannick Jadot, conservative Valerie Pecresse, far-right former TV pundit Eric Zemmour and flagging Socialist nominee Anne Hidalgo also have rallies planned Thursday.
Macron will give an interview to the Aujourd'hui newspaper in which he is expected to continue his strategy of promising steady leadership in a time of crisis, while portraying Le Pen as a dangerous extremist.
Despite entering the campaign late after being distracted by the war in Ukraine, he has no scheduled public events on Thursday.
"I've acquired experience of crises, international experience. I've also learned from my mistakes," he told Le Figaro newspaper in an interview published Thursday.
He acknowledged that "results on immigration were insufficient" and that new arrivals had increased at the start of his term in 2017-2019.
"Worries were created at this point. I didn't succeed in reducing them and they have fed the (political) extremes," he said in reference to Le Pen and Zemmour, who is promising "zero immigration."
A recent poll found that a slim majority of French people (51 percent) found Le Pen worrying, while 39 percent considered she had the stature of a president, up from 21 percent in 2017.
Around 65 percent of French people thought Macron had the stature of a president, the survey from the left-leaning Jean-Jaures Foundation showed.
Le Pen laughed at the idea that she could be demonised on her third run for the presidency despite Macron's intention of attacking her as economically reckless and xenophobic.
"Scare-mongering which entails saying that unless Emmanuel Macron is re-elected, it will be a crisis, the sun will be extinguished, the sea will disappear and we'll suffer an invasion of frogs, no longer works," Le Pen told RTL.
C.Kovalenko--BTB