France’s lower house of parliament recently approved a bill to ban the wearing of a burqa or niqab in public. People caught wearing garments “that hide the face” will be fined 150 euro and those who force women to cover up could be fined up to 30,000 euro and face a one-year jail term. Some of those in favour of the ban say it stems from the French concept of laïcité, a model of secularism which upholds freedom of and …
France exited the World Cup with a 2-1 loss to hosts South Africa after being reduced to ten men 26 minutes into the game. The French finished bottom of their group and, unfortunately, South Africa also failed to progress. From The Guardian Sports Blog’s Amy Lawrence La fin. Let the discredits roll. Let Les Bleus depart the total shambles that they are. Their World Cup 2010 experience has been so unfathomably awful, it is hard to know where to begin with the inquest. A …
The BBC has a country-by-country guide to the EU austerity measures, including the bickering France and Germany. And, as the Irish Times reports, EU Commission president, José Manuel Barroso, lays down the law Amid intensive debate among European governments around measures required to reinforce the euro’s foundations, Mr Barroso said some of the member states needed to be reminded that the commission was “the economic government of Europe”. France and Germany have been at loggerheads over the scale of the measures …
German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Nicolas Sarkozy are presenting a united front in public, and pointing at a global bank levy. But, as the Irish Times reports, behind the scenes things are not well with the European leaders In an hurried show of unity, the two leaders penned a joint letter to the European Commission, urging it to speed up efforts to regulate EU financial markets. Ahead of yesterday’s meeting, French finance minister Christine Lagarde insisted that a new …
