Gavin Mortimer

Marine Le Pen’s political career ended this morning when a Paris judge found her guilty of misusing EU funds. She was sentenced to four years' imprisonment, two of which are suspended and two will be served under an ankle bracelet. She was also fined €100,000 (£84,000) and disbarred from politics for five years. Few anticipated such a severe sentence – it is one that will send shockwaves not just through France but across Europe. Also convicted alongside the leader of the National Rally were 24 other party members – including eight MEPs – all found guilty of channelling €2.9 million (£2.4 million) of EU money to their own party’s coffers.

It has long been said by some of Emmanuel Macron’s opponents that he is a president who ‘governs by fear’. It began with his management of Covid five years, when he imposed on France one of the most stringent lockdowns in the world. ‘We are at war’, he declared in a televised address to the nation on 16 March. Now he is at it again, issuing dire warnings about the possibility of war just as America, Russia and Ukraine have started talking about peace. There is still a long way to go before the conflict in Ukraine ends, but the President of France appears pessimistic about the chances of peace.

Might a headscarf bring down France’s coalition government? The question of whether the Islamic garment should be permitted on the sports field has revealed the ideological differences within Prime Minister Francois Bayrou’s fragile government. On the one hand, there are left-leaning ministers such as Elisabeth Borne (Education) and Marie Barsacq (Sport and youth) who see nothing wrong with the headscarf. Others, principally, Gérald Darmanin (Justice) and Bruno Retailleau (Interior), are fiercely opposed. Retailleau recently took Barsacq to task over her stance, saying the headscarf 'is not a form of freedom, but a form of submission for women'.

Violence broke out in Bucharest on Sunday evening after Romania’s Central Electoral Bureau disqualified Cǎlin Georgescu from running in May’s re-run presidential election. In a statement, the bureau justified its decision to exclude Georgescu on the grounds that his candidacy “doesn’t meet the conditions of legality” because he “violated the very obligation to defend democracy.” Supporters of Georgescu, whom the BBC has described as a “far-right, pro-Russia candidate,” gathered outside the Central Electoral Bureau to express their outrage and soon clashed with police. Until six months ago, Georgescu’s name was virtually unknown outside Romania.

Keir Starmer and Emmanuel Macron are in competition to be the de facto leader of the European response to the diplomatic crisis between Donald Trump and Ukraine's president Zelensky. The cynic might wonder if Macron isn’t perhaps making the most of the fallout to boost his standing after a calamitous few months. The French president’s reputation has not recovered from his decision last June to call a snap election; the result was political chaos and three prime ministers in six months. Few French have confidence in their president to handle the situation Ukraine effectively Domestically, France is a disaster zone. Lawlessness, immigration and an ailing economy are just three reasons why last month a poll found that Macron’s approval rating had sunk to 25 per cent.

Last December the European Commission published its ‘priorities’ for the next five years. All the bases were covered, from defence to sustainable prosperity to social fairness. And of course, the most important priority of all, democracy. ‘Europe’s future in a fractured world will depend on having a strong democracy and on defending the values that give Europeans the freedoms and rights that they cherish,’ proclaimed the Commission, which pledged it was committed to ‘putting citizens at the heart of our democracy’. December was the same month that a Romanian court cancelled the presidential election, after the surprise first round victory of the Eurosceptic and anti-progressive Călin Georgescu.

Jordan Bardella flew to America last week on a trip he had long boasted about. The president of the National Rally – and all his party – had been a little put out that the only French politicians invited to Donald Trump’s inauguration were Eric Zemmour and Sarah Knafo of the right-wing Reconquest. It was with relish, then, that Bardella boarded a flight to Washington to attend the annual Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC). Here was his party’s chance to announce itself to America, while rubbing shoulders with the representatives of the new zeitgeist: JD Vance, Slovakian Prime Minister Robert Fico, Giorgia Meloni, Argentine President Javier Milei, Blighty’s own Nigel Farage, and of course, the man himself, Donald J. Trump. Only, Bardella never took to the stage.

Emmanuel Macron will hold talks with Donald Trump on Monday at which the President of France will attempt to ‘make Europe’s voice heard’. Still seething about being excluded from America’s peace negotiations with Russia, Macron wants to reassert the continent’s authority Stateside.  It will be a forlorn exercise. One of the reasons America – not just Trump’s administration but the one that preceded it – no longer attaches much importance to the EU is because they can see how weak it’s become. The world understands that Macron talks the talk but never walks the walk It’s timidity towards Algeria is a prime example. On Saturday, an Algerian man was arrested by police after allegedly running amok with a knife in the French city of Mulhouse.

It’s an established fact that most of Britain’s drug trade is controlled by Albanians. There is some competition from Turks and Pakistanis but Albanians dominate the industry with their ‘business-like’ methods. They may soon have another partner in crime. Nigerian gangs are increasingly making their presence felt in Europe: this week they were among 27 people arrested in coordinated police raids in Italy, Spain and Albania. According to Italy's Carabinieri, the arrests encompassed two drug trafficking gangs, one of which was a Nigerian operation in which they used their young compatriots seeking a new life in Europe to traffic marijuana across the continent.

Giorgia Meloni was nearly an hour late for Monday’s European crisis summit at the Elysee Palace in Paris. According to the French press, Italy’s prime minister made her appearance ‘in the middle of the meeting, 50 minutes later than the agreed time’. Perhaps her Maserati got caught in the Paris traffic, or perhaps Meloni made her late entrance intentionally; a way of underlining to her host, Emmanuel Macron, and the other European leaders present, that she alone has a warm relationship with Donald Trump. Meloni visited Trump’s Mar-a-Lago club for what both parties called an 'informal meeting' at the start of the year. The then President-elect described the Italian as a ‘fantastic woman’ and told reporters that ‘she’s really taken Europe by storm’.