France

Not quite a ghost town, but when I emerged from the metro at Saint-Germain-des-Prés at midday central Paris was eerily calm for a Saturday in the festive season. I once lived in this district and December was always a nightmare for shoppers and tourists. Not today. Louis Vuitton was shut and boarded, so, too, Swarovski and a couple of banks and most cafes. I walked towards the Seine and on the Quai Voltaire I encountered my first riot police. They had a dozen Gilets Jaunes against the wall, frisking them in a courteous manner. Crossing the Pont des Arts I spotted a Father Christmas in a Yellow Vest walking briskly

Marine Le Pen spent last Saturday commenting on the scenes from the Champs-Elysées as the latest Gilets Jaunes demonstration turned violent. She also had the opportunity to respond to Christophe Castaner, the interior minister who, as cobbles rained down on the heads of the riot police, accused Le Pen of inciting the far-right to go on the rampage. Le Pen rejected the allegations, saying she had done no such thing; and anyway, as far as the National Rally leader was concerned, the people running amok in the capital weren’t from the far-right. Le Pen’s view was endorsed by Marion Maréchal, who unlike her aunt, chose to witness the latest manifestation of

Out and about in Paris on Saturday I passed scores of protestors on their way to the Champs-Élysées to vent their fury against Emmanuel Macron. Wearing their gilet jaunes (yellow vests), they were angry, determined and overwhelmingly white and middle-aged. The nationwide protest that pulled in nearly 300,000 demonstrators has been billed as a pushback against rising fuel tax but it goes much deeper than that; it’s the revolt of the people against a president they believe holds them in contempt. As one demonstrator told Le Figaro: ‘Macron is the president of the rich and not the poor. He should think also about the poor.’ Macron rarely thinks about the poor,

Emmanuel Macron’s hosting of sixty world leaders in Paris last weekend to commemorate the centenary of the Armistice has turned into a public relations disaster. The president of the Republic not only infuriated Donald Trump, but he also put the Serbian president’s nose out of joint. According to reports, Aleksandar Vucic was not amused with the seating arrangements at Sunday’s service of remembrance. While Kosovo’s president Hashim Thaçi was behind the leaders of France, Germany, Russia, and the United States, Vucic was shunted off to the side. “You can imagine how I felt,” Thaci is quoted as telling the Serbian media. “I couldn’t believe what I was seeing before me, knowing

As chalices go, few are as poisoned as the one Emmanuel Macron has just handed Christophe Castaner. Minister of the interior is one of the most challenging posts in government. The former Socialist MP has cultivated an image over the years of a political tough guy, in contrast to his predecessor, the diminutive Gérard Collomb. But what passes for tough in the National Assembly won’t intimidate the tough guys in France’s inner cities. During his eighteen months in the post, Collomb was a diligent minister, but in the end the 71-year-old was worn down by the enormity of his task. He parted with a message that should cause his successor