The first round of local elections happens next Sunday (March 15th), with 34,000 communes, from tiny villages up to the major cities, heading out to elect the local mayors who play a huge part in shaping the life and infrastructure of each area.
A garda has been suspended after allegedly making continual remarks to a younger female colleague that have been described as "either racist or sexist, depending on what way you interpret it".
The festival of Pailhasses is one of France's most ancient carnival traditions. Celebrating the end of a longstanding rivalry with a neighbouring village, it has for more than 700 years allowed villagers to release frustrations before Lent. Its rituals are about strength, chasing and some form of attack. It is also notoriously secretive.
At the official launch last November, the current culture minister Rachida Dati described the imperative behind the programme as not just celebrating an uncommon visionary but the "burning relevance" of his legacy: "a commitment to continuing to nurture this demanding idea of what culture is".
Rare Disease Day, on 28 February, highlights the more than 6,100 conditions identified worldwide, including xeroderma pigmentosum (XP), a rare genetic disorder that affects just over 100 people in France. Those affected are often referred to as Children of the Moon, a name that reflects their extreme sensitivity to ultraviolet light.
Sweden's navy vessel jammed the drone 13km from France's flagship, the Charles de Gaulle aircraft carrier, while it was in the Oresund stretch of water, between Denmark and Sweden. French foreign minister Jean-Noel Barrot told journalists that if Russian involvement was confirmed, the only conclusion would be that it would be a ridiculous provocation.
Rachida Dati leaves a ministry struggling with budgetary cuts and badly shaken by the stunning theft of the French crown jewels from the Louvre in October. An ongoing parliamentary investigation has underlined the responsibility the ministry bears for the museum's security failings. One day before her own resignation, the Louvre's director Laurence des Cars stepped down.
Unlike Americans, who treat their weekends as a sprint to see who can do the most chores, Sundays are sacred in France-a time to slow down, reset for the week, and do as little as possible. Even protests in France happen every day except Sunday . . . that's how sacred [they] are.
A total 5,722 people died as a direct result of the summer heat in 2025, the third hottest summer on record and one which featured two severe extended heatwaves in late June/early July and in the middle of August, a Santé Publique France report shows. Of those fatalities, more than 1,900 were attributed directly to heat exposure - which represented 12 percent of all deaths during the periods of high heat.
Thanks to the development of high-speed rail and the slowdown in our capital expenditure, we aim to strengthen the growth of our results over the next decade. Earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation stood at €859 million, exceeding targets set and reconfirmed last year.
CultureClic is one of the most comprehensive French art apps available. Designed as a mobile-first discovery tool, it maps out more than 1,350 museums across France and highlights hundreds of geolocated artworks, photographs, and historical engravings. The app is particularly strong in Paris but also features content in cities like Bordeaux, Lyon, Marseille, and Avignon. What sets CultureClic apart is its use of augmented reality, allowing users to visualize artworks and historical documents in context.
In France, eating solo is deeply frowned upon. A recent poll found that, while just 12% of French workers over the age of 49 regularly lunched alone, the number shot up to 29% for workers under 25. A 25-year-old worker in the French paper Les Echos described mandatory dining with colleagues as patriarchal, and after she started eating alone, was fired for failing to integrate with her team.
In the southwest, the mild weather has turned into outright spring heat, with temperatures worthy of May. Temperatures, already high for this season, are climbing further between Tuesday and Wednesday, with readings exceeding 25C at multiple stations.
Activists managed to temporarily hang a new picture in Paris' Louvre - the arrest photo of UK royal family member Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor. The activists from the anti-billionaire collective Everybody Hates Elon arrived at the Paris museum with a copy of the arrest photo of Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor, and stuck it on the wall in one of the galleries. They posted a video about the stunt on Sunday.
We are going to summon the United States ambassador to France since the US embassy in France commented on this tragedy, which concerns the national community, Barrot told the French newspaper Le Monde and public broadcasters France Inter and France Info on Sunday. We reject any attempt to use this tragedy for political purposes, he added. The Ministry for Europe and Foreign Affairs did not say when Kushner, the father of Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner, would be summoned.
Ukraine's foreign ministry has condemned what it describes as ultimatums and blackmail by Hungary and Slovakia on Saturday, after both governments threatened to stop electricity supplies to Ukraine unless Kyiv restarts flows of Russian oil. Hungary has also threatened to block a 90bn Ukrainian war loan. Shipments of Russian oil to Hungary and Slovakia have been cut off since 27 January, when Kyiv says a Russian drone strike hit pipeline equipment in western Ukraine.
From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The Independent is on the ground when the story is developing. Whether it's investigating the financials of Elon Musk's pro-Trump PAC or producing our latest documentary, 'The A Word', which shines a light on the American women fighting for reproductive rights, we know how important it is to parse out the facts from the messaging.
A French soldier, Alexandre Lanckbeen, died after being accidentally shot in the head during a drunken evening at a barracks near Paris. The incident occurred on 14 February at the Percy Military Training Hospital in Clamart, where alcohol consumption is prohibited. Soldiers had obtained alcohol and were drinking when a loaded handgun was discharged during a reaction game, striking Lanckbeen. Lanckbeen was taken to hospital but subsequently died from his wounds.
We're a 10-minute walk from the Palace of Versailles. My wife attends ISIPCA, one of the most prestigious graduate perfumery programs in the world, and I'm an American writer living right outside Paris. It may sound glamorous, but my daily routine hasn't really changed. Before our move in October, I sat in front of a computer all day. After our move, my life has looked pretty much the same.
Burberry's Hero eau de toilette is a great pick for a classic, everyday cologne. It's masculine and woody, with base notes of cedarwood. Add a burst of freshness at the top from bergamot and juniper, and the result is crisp, deep, and a little spicy. Fragrance Family Woody, spicy Notes Bergamot, juniper, black pepper, Atlas cedar, Virginia cedar, Himalayan cedar Sizes 1.6 oz, 3.3 oz, 5 oz
A French prosecutor is seeking murder charges against seven suspects in the fatal beating of a far-right activist that has fuelled political anger beyond France's borders, prompting Emmanuel Macron to tell Italy's far-right prime minister, Giorgia Meloni, to keep out of French affairs. Quentin Deranque, 23, died from head injuries after being attacked by at least six people on the sidelines of a far-right protest in Lyon on 12 February.
Since the end of January, the hacker used the stolen credentials of an official to access and consult "parts of the file of all of the accounts open in French banks and which contains personal data such as bank account numbers, name of the account holder, address and in certain cases the account owner's tax number," the ministry said in a statement.
