Dramatic protests across the north of France have won the country’s farmers €600m of emergency government help. This week thousands of tractors blockaded motorways and brought cities to a standstill, as the plight of producers dominated the nation’s news.
President Francois Hollande has said he would unveil emergency measures to help France’s livestock and dairy farmers on Wednesday. Tuesday’s announcement came as as livestock farmers caused chaos in the north west of France, using tractors and trucks full of manure and rubble to block roads.
France favors a stronger organization behind the Euro led by a vanguard of countries, French President Francois Hollande said in an interview published Sunday. In the past week the European spirit prevailed in addressing the Greek crisis, he told the weekly Journal du Dimanche.
France and Germany told Greece to come up with serious proposals in order to restart financial aid talks, raising pressure on Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras to compromise a day after his country voted overwhelmingly against more austerity
The latest revelations of allegations of irregular payments by FIFA have brought Ireland, South Africa and Venezuela under the spotlight. In effect a FIFA official has admitted Ireland received 5 million dollars in compensation for missing out on a place at the 2010 World Cup after a handball by player Thierry Henry gave France victory and a place in South Africa.
French President Francois Hollande has urged an end to the US trade embargo of Cuba and envisioned a larger French role in Cuba's engagement with the West during the first visit by a French head of state to Cuba. Havana is in foreign policy talks with both the European Union and the United States amid intense world interest in Cuba following detente with Washington in December.
There was both good and bad news for France in this week’s annual report on the outlook of the wine industry by the International Organization of Wine and Vine (OIV).
The far-right National Front (FN) made only limited gains in French local elections won by ex-president Nicolas Sarkozy's conservatives. The anti-immigrant, anti-EU party is likely to have won up to 108 local council seats, from holding only one currently. But they will have too few in any one of the 102 departements to control any of them, updated Sunday exit polls showed.
Hundreds turned out in the western German town of Haltern am See to mourn 16 students and two teachers lost in Tuesday’s Germanwings crash in the French Alps. The Airbus A320 crashed en route to Dusseldorf from Barcelona, likely killing all 150 on board, in what would be the worst air accident on French soil in three decades. Spain declared three days of national mourning.
France, Germany and Italy on Tuesday announced plans to join the Chinese-led development bank AIIB, drawing concern in Washington which views the institution with skepticism. The three European countries want ”to become founding members of the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB)”, they said in a statement.