Blog Masonry

Decision day for France's would-be president

France’s Alain Juppe, a man who would be president, finds out in court today whether he can stay in politics at all, let alone dream of one day taking over as head of state from Jacques Chirac.

A judge delivers his verdict in a trial where prosecutors sought an eight-year suspended prison term for the Chirac protege who they say illegally used Paris municipal funds to pay political allies.

The 58-year-old has been steadily clawing his way back to the top since his demise as one of the nation’s most unloved prime ministers in 1997, but a conviction would automatically make him ineligible for public office.

“I’d quit politics,” Juppe said when asked this month what he would do if things went against him. Commentators took that as a sign that he would not even appeal if convicted.

French wine's new woe

French winemakers, shunned by some Americans last year over France’s opposition to the Iraq war, face a new problem in 2004: the rise in the euro.

Industry leaders said on Thursday the currency’s surge to new highs against the dollar could make French wine seem too expensive to U.S. consumers also being offered keenly priced New World rivals from Australia and elsewhere.

“Buyers of fine wines are not overly sensitive to price variations,” Michel Pons, head of promotion at the national Onivins agency, said of the euro’s 40 percent gain since 2002 to a record $1.29 earlier this month. It is now around $1.25.

“But the impact is greater among the less prestigious wines selling for around $10 a bottle — and it is there that the competition is the hottest,” he told Reuters.

Opinion: France: Friend or foe?

On the July day American troops killed Saddam Hussein’s sons Qusai and Odai in the northern Iraqi city in Mosul, a senior NBC News producer called his usual intelligence and military sources trying to learn more about the raid.

As his best CIA source gushed about the American victory, the producer says he noticed a news bulletin on the television behind him: the Eiffel Tower, that great symbol of French grandeur and artistic prowess, had caught fire.

So I asked him, ‘Hey, do you guys know the Eiffel Tower’s on fire’? the producer said.

He was silent for a moment, then he said: Could this day get any better?

A joke, or not?

France agrees draft anti-veil law

The French cabinet has approved a draft law banning most religious symbols in state schools, launching the legislative process Paris says it needs to stem a rise in militant Islam among its Muslim minority.

The centre-right government, pushing through the measure on Wednesday with unusual speed, will submit to the National Assembly next Tuesday the draft law barring Muslim headscarves, Jewish skullcaps and large Christian crosses from school premises.

“The government bill clearly reaffirms the neutrality of public schools. It does not aim to ban religious symbols in everyday life,” President Jacques Chirac told the cabinet, according to government spokesman Jean-Francois Cope.

Editorial: Besmirching the tricolor

Politicians change their stances with the same ease as they flip the pages of a book. This is as true today as it was in the past. Only a few months ago, French President Jacques Chirac raised the moral banner high as he took the lead in criticizing a US-led war in Iraq. Chirac never forgot to mention “principles” and to pose as a savior of small nations the world over. Now he wears a different face as Chinese President Hu Jintao (胡錦濤) visits his country. He has forgotten about principles entirely as he criticizes — with vitriol matching that of the Zhongnanhai leaders — President Chen Shui-bian’s (陳水扁) plan to hold a referendum alongside the presidential election.

France receives new warning from EU on budget discipline

In a report on France’s mid-term economic forecasts, the European Union’s executive body said that the French government’s budgetary plans “lack ambition,” and warned that Paris is set to burst the deficit ceiling of 3 percent of gross domestic product through 2007.

Italy, Greece, and two of the EU members considered best at budgetary management, the Netherlands and Britain, were warned that their deficits risked breaching the ceiling, the commission said in separate reports on each country.