France

PARIS, April 25 (Xinhua) -- France has launched a battle to contain highly infectious variants of COVID-19 by reinforcing border control, ramping up tests and imposing mandatory 10-day quarantine for all arrivals from high-risk countries, where the new coronavirus strains are active, Prime Minister Jean Castex said on Sunday.

"We have launched the battle against these variants which are a threat against which we must protect ourselves," Castex told reporters at Roissy Charles-de-Gaulle airport.

PARIS (AP) — Protesters in Paris and other French cities on Sunday denounced a ruling by France’s highest court that the killer of Jewish woman Sarah Halimi was not criminally responsible and therefore could not go on trial.

Thousands of people filled Trocadero Plaza in Paris, in front of the Eiffel Tower, answering a call by Jewish associations and groups fighting antisemitism who say that justice has not been done. Other protests took place in Marseille, Lyon, Strasbourg, Bordeaux and elsewhere.

(Reuters) --- The Tunisian national who killed a police administrative worker last Friday near Paris had watched religious videos glorifying acts of jihad just before carrying out his attack, said France's anti-terrorism prosecutor Jean-Francois Ricard.

The murder has shocked France, which faces a presidential election next year at which issues such as fears over terrorist attacks, immigration and violent crime will dominate the agenda.

RAMBOUILLET, France (AP) — French authorities opened a terrorism investigation and detained three people after a police official was stabbed to death inside a police station outside Paris. Officers shot and killed the attacker at the scene Friday, authorities said.

The attack stunned the quiet residential neighborhood near the famed historic chateau of Rambouillet, and prompted renewed French government promises to fight extremism and protect police.

(Reuters) --- France's foreign minister told Russia on Thursday that the European Union would hold President Vladimir Putin and Russian authorities responsible if hunger-striking Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny died and said the bloc would impose new sanctions.

The 44-year-old Navalny, who last year survived a nerve agent attack that Russian authorities denied carrying out, is thin and weak after starving himself for three weeks in prison, and his allies say he risks kidney failure or cardiac arrest.

PARIS (AP) — The French government bears “significant” responsibility for “enabling a foreseeable genocide,” a report commissioned by the Rwandan government concludes about France’s role before and during the horror in which an estimated 800,000 people were slaughtered in 1994.

The report, which The Associated Press has read, comes amid efforts by Rwanda to document the role of French authorities before, during, and after the genocide, part of the steps taken by France’s President Emmanuel Macron to improve relations with the central African country.

PARIS, April 18 (NNN-AGENCIES) — France will impose a 10-day quarantine on arrivals from Argentina, Brazil, Chile and South Africa over concerns about variants of the coronavirus, the prime minister’s office announced.

Although flights from Argentina, Chile and South Africa will not be suspended, all arrivals from those countries will have to submit to the quarantine or face fines.

(Reuters) --- World powers should draw "clear red lines" with Russia and consider possible sanctions against Moscow when they're crossed, French President Emmanuel Macron told U.S. news network CBS in an interview.

"We have to define clear red lines with Russia," Macron said, according to a video excerpt of the interview to be aired later on Sunday.

PARIS, April 17 (NNN-AGENCIES) — The global coronavirus death toll was expected to reach three million on Saturday, as the race for immunisation continues and countries like India grapple with rising infections and new lockdowns.

The virus that surfaced in late 2019 in central China and the ensuing pandemic has infected more than 100 million people, leaving billions more under crippling lockdowns and ravaging the global economy.

PARIS (AP) — Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy is holding talks on Friday with French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Angela Merkel amid growing tensions with Russia, which has deployed troops at the border with the country.

Zelenskyy is traveling to Paris to meet with Macron during a working lunch at the Elysee presidential palace. Both heads of state will then talk via videoconference with Merkel, Macron’s office said.