Gavin Mortimer is a British author who lives in Burgundy after many years in Paris. He writes about French politics, terrorism and sport.
The Rugby World Cup kicks off in just under ten weeks with hosts France playing New Zealand in the Stade de France. The national stadium sits squarely in Seine-Saint-Denis, a district which yesterday was smouldering after a night of anarchy. Shops were looted, cars torched and a bus station destroyed in an orgy of violence
France endured its worst night of rioting yet on Thursday as violence continued across the country. For the third consecutive evening, youths went on the rampage in most major cities, despite the presence of 40,000 police. Shops were looted, town halls attacked, police stations firebombed and vehicles were hijacked in extraordinary scenes of urban warfare.
Emmanuel Macron is facing arguably the gravest crisis of his presidency after another night of rioting across France. Much of the trouble was in the Paris region, particularly Nanterre, to the west of capital, where on Tuesday police shot dead a 17-year-old after he sped away from a vehicle checkpoint. On a night of extreme
Much of Paris was a battleground on Tuesday evening as scores of youths rioted following the fatal shooting of a teenager by police. The 17-year-old, Naël (some reports spell his name as Nahel), was stopped by police at approximately 8.30 on Tuesday morning because of his erratic driving. According to reports, Naël had previous convictions
‘The left is sweeping to power across Europe,’ suggested the headline in the Independent in September 2021. The newspaper called on the analysis of Denis MacShane, the former Labour MP, to explains to its readers why this was so. MacShane posited that the election of Joe Biden as US president had reinvigorated the left-wing electorate
Numerous heads of state from the third world are in Paris for a summit hosted by President Macron. The aim of the conference – or the Summit for a New Global Financing Pact to give it its full lofty name – is to ‘address the needs of developing countries in the fight against poverty.’ Is
Emmanuel Macron never does anything by chance, so why did he allow himself to be filmed downing a beer in one on Saturday night? The clip, which has gone viral, has angered puritanical progressives. Green MP Sandrine Rousseau has branded Macron’s behaviour ‘toxic masculinity’. The president of the French Republic slaked his thirst just before
There is a growing sense of unease in France that a new wave of Islamist terrorism will soon break over Europe. In February, Adel Bakawan, a Franco-Iranian specialist in Islamic extremism, said that the Islamic State is regrouping and is planning a mass casualty attack in ‘Berlin, London or Paris’. This week Thibault de Montbrial, president
Silvio Berlusconi should be remembered for more than just his passion for football and sex. He was the first European leader this century to identity illegal immigration as an existential threat to the stability and cohesion of the continent. Ironically, the former Italian prime minister’s infamous ‘Bunga-Bunga’ parties reportedly owed their name to a joke
The Green mayor of Annecy, François Astorg, declared a fortnight ago that his town in the south-east of France was ‘a land of resistance against fascism, a land of solidarity, a refugee town for those fleeing war, misery and the unhappiness in the world’. On Thursday, Astorg, expressed his ‘immense sadness’ and his ‘anger’ hours after
What kind of man walks into a park on a summer’s day and randomly stabs and slashes at toddlers? That is the question France is asking itself today after the latest in a long line of bloody atrocities. The scene of this morning’s attack was in Annecy in south-eastern France, a popular holiday resort. An eye-witness said
France, Sweden, Italy, Finland and now Spain. The demise of the left in western Europe continues apace and yet their only solution is to seethe about fascists in a make believe world of their own. Nine months after Giorgia Meloni was elected Prime Minister – remember the hysterical warnings about her being Mussolini in
Perhaps the most illuminating comment made by Nigel Farage during his discussion with Fraser Nelson on Spectator TV earlier this month was when he reflected on the Brexit campaign. ‘I remember being told, by [Daniel] Hannan and Boris Johnson, “no, no, don’t discuss immigration in the referendum”,’ reminisced the former leader of UKIP. ‘”We’ll lose
The head of the French Olympic Committee has resigned just over a year out from the Games’ opening in Paris. Brigitte Henriques announced her decision at the Games’ committee’s general assembly, the result according to the French media of ‘a year-and-a-half of internal squabbling.’ There was much fanfare when Henriques was nominated to the role
The Rugby Football Union will fly the ‘Pride Progress’ flag at Twickenham this weekend, when a World XV team play the Barbarians invitational side. According to the Daily Telegraph, the RFU’s decision is ‘in response to the selection of Israel Folau’ in the World XV. The 34-year-old Folau was a regular in the Australian team
Paris has a problem. The city currently houses some 5,000 migrants in hotels, much to the chagrin of the capital’s hoteliers. France’s capital is hosting two major tournaments in the next year: the Rugby World Cup in September and the Olympics next summer. An enduring headache for president Macron is where supporters will stay; hotels
The story that dominated much of the French media last week was the vicious assault of a shopkeeper in Amiens. A gang kicked and punched Jean-Baptiste Trogneux outside his chocolate shop in a savage attack that left him bruised and nursing a couple of broken ribs. It was, alas, an all too common incident in a
Hell hath no fury like an environmentalist scorned and Emmanuel Macron has felt a wave of green wrath since his declaration last week that France has gone far enough in pursuit of net zero. ‘We are ahead, in regulatory terms, of the Americans, the Chinese and of any other power in the world,’ said Macron in
Across Europe the numbers are soaring. In Britain, net migration figures are expected to near one million when the figures are released later this month; in Germany, there have been 101,981 asylum applications so far this year, an increase of 78 per cent on the same period in 2022. 2022 was a record year
Tuesday was ‘Europe Day’, or as the European Union proclaimed on its website, the occasion to ‘celebrate peace and unity’ and give thanks to Robert Schuman. It was the French statesman’s declaration on 9 May 1950 that put in place the framework ‘for a new form of political cooperation in Europe’. No leader in Europe
