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Jean-Marie Le Pen, French far-right leader, dies aged 96 Jean-Marie Le Pen, French far-right leader, dies aged 96
(about 2 hours later)
Former paratrooper led National Front party for decades and courted controversy, being repeatedly fined for contesting crimes against humanityFormer paratrooper led National Front party for decades and courted controversy, being repeatedly fined for contesting crimes against humanity
Jean-Marie Le Pen, founder of France’s far-right National Rally party, has died aged 96. Jean-Marie Le Pen, the founder of France’s far-right National Front party, who sent shock waves through the country when he made it to the second round of the presidential election in 2002, has died aged 96.
The former paratrooper, who led the party from 1972 to 2011 when it was called the National Front, had been in a care facility for several weeks and died at midday on Tuesday “surrounded by his loved ones”, his family said in a statement. The former paratrooper, who led the party from 1972 to 2011, was repeatedly convicted over comments about the Holocaust, which he once dismissed as “merely a detail of history”.
Le Pen faced charges last year along with his daughter Marine Le Pen over allegations they and other figures in their National Rally party embezzled money from the European parliament with fake jobs. Jean-Marie Le Pen was excused from attending court for health reasons. His daughter Marine Le Pen took the party’s leadership in 2011 and expelled him four years later, seeking to distance the movement from his extremist reputation. The party has since been renamed the National Rally (RN).
Le Pen repeatedly courted controversy and legal action with his views on the Holocaust, which he described as a “mere detail” in the history of the second world war, and his lauding of France’s wartime government at Vichy that collaborated with the country’s Nazi occupiers. Le Pen’s family said in a statement that he had been in a care facility for several weeks and he died at midday on Tuesday “surrounded by his loved ones”.
He has been convicted and fined several times for contesting crimes against humanity. In 2014, he suggested the deadly Ebola virus, could be a solution to the global population explosion. Two years later, he was convicted of “provoking hatred and ethnic discrimination” for telling a public meeting three years earlier that Roma in the city were “rash-inducing” and smelly. However, it emerged that Marine Le Pen only learned of his death from reporters while flying back from a visit to the French Indian Ocean island Mayotte, where she had been visiting victims of Cyclone Chido.
The pugilistic Le Pen, who is believed to have lost his left eye in a fight - he later insisted it was damaged in a banal accident with a tent pole - was made lifetime honorary president of the FN when his daughter took over as party leader in 2011. She threw him out in 2015 after he refused to temper his incendiary language as she attempted to clean up the FN’s reputation but only finally succeeded in ejecting him from the party in 2018 after several legal battles. Sophie Dupont, a journalist with BFMTV who was on the plane with Marine Le Pen, said the politician was told when the flight made a technical stop in Nairobi. “Marine Le Pen’s press officer didn’t know. He went to tell her,” Dupont said.
Le Pen stood for president five times and shocked France in 2002 when he knocked the Socialist candidate Lionel Jospin out of the first round of the vote and found himself against Jacques Chirac in a second round vote for the Elysée. Chirac won by a convincing margin - more than 82% of votes. Marine Le Pen’s entourage said she would not make any immediate comment.
Jean-Marie Le Pen was born the only child a Breton fisherman and his seamstress wife. His father died when Jean, as he was then, was 14, after a mine caught up in his net exploded. At 16, he asked to join the military but was refused as too young. He later joined the French Foreign Legion’s parachute regiment and took part in the war in Indochina and in the Algerian war of independence, during which he was accused of torturing detainees. The Elysée, in a statement, trod a diplomatic line, summarising Le Pen’s political career: an MP three times, a presidential candidate five times, an MEP seven times, a town councillor and regional councillor. “A historic figure of the far right, he played a role in the public life of our country for nearly 70 years, which is now a matter for history to judge,” it said.
In 1962, Le Pen told the newspaper Combat: “I’ve nothing to hide. We tortured because it had to be done. When you’ve caught someone who’s just planted 20 bombs that could explode from one minute to the next and he doesn’t want to talk, you have to use exceptional methods to make him do so”. Later, Le Pen denied further accusations of torture Algeria, claiming they were part of a left-wing “government plot” to discredit him. RN said Le Pen had defended “the idea of French greatness with all his soul and at the risk of his own life”.
He was first elected as an MP in 1956 and co-founded the Front National in 1972. He remained an MP until 1988 and became an MEP in 2004 serving until 2019. He was also a regional councillor in the Provence-Alpes-Côte-d’Azur between 2010 and 2015. He had three daughters with his first wife Pierrette of whom, Marine is the youngest. He is now reported to be closest to his granddaughter, Marion Maréchal, daughter of Yann Le Pen, his middle child. He married his second wife, Jany, in 1991. Last year Le Pen faced charges, along with Marine Le Pen, over allegations they and other party figures had embezzled money from the European parliament with fake jobs. Jean-Marie Le Pen was excused from attending court for health reasons.
Twenty-three years ago he had put the far right at the heart of French politics with his surprise, second-place finish in the first round of the 2002 presidential election. In the run-off he was defeated by Jacques Chirac in a landslide.
Controversies over his statements about race and the Holocaust put him at odds with his daughter’s attempts to sanitise the party and move away from its jackbooted, antisemitic image.
He was convicted and fined several times for contesting crimes against humanity, and in 2014 suggested the Ebola virus could be a solution to the global population explosion. Two years later, he was convicted of “provoking hatred and ethnic discrimination” for telling a public meeting three years earlier that Roma in the city were “rash-inducing” and smelly.
Le Pen was made lifetime honorary president of the FN when his daughter took over as party leader in 2011. She threw him out in 2015 after he refused to temper his incendiary language as she attempted to clean up the FN’s reputation, but only finally succeeded in ejecting him in 2018 after several legal battles.
Jean-Marie Le Pen was born on 20 June 1928, the only child a Breton fisherer and his wife, a seamstress. In his autobiography, Mémoires: fils de la nation (Son of the Nation), he described his childhood as “modest” in a home with “a dirt floor”. His father died in 1942 when Jean, as he was then, was 14, after a mine caught up in his fishing net exploded.
At 16, Le Pen sought to join the military – specifically the French Interior Forces (FFI) – but was refused as too young. Col Henri de la Vaissière reportedly told him: “Think of your mother”. In 1946, he was expelled from his secondary school and moved to the Paris region, where he passed his baccalauréat and began studying law.
He later joined the French Foreign Legion’s parachute regiment and took part in the war in Indochina and in the Algerian war of independence, during which he was accused of torturing detainees.
In 1962, Le Pen told the newspaper Combat: “I’ve nothing to hide. We tortured because it had to be done. When you’ve caught someone who’s just planted 20 bombs that could explode from one minute to the next and he doesn’t want to talk, you have to use exceptional methods to make him do so.” Later, Le Pen denied further accusations of torture in Algeria, claiming they were part of a left-wing “government plot” to discredit him.
He was first elected as an MP in 1956 and co-founded the National Front in 1972. He remained an MP until 1988 and became an MEP in 2004, serving until 2019. He was also a regional councillor in the Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur between 2010 and 2015. He had three daughters with his first wife, Pierrette, of whom Marine was the youngest. He was reported to have been closest to his granddaughter, Marion Maréchal, daughter of Yann Le Pen, his middle child. He married his second wife, Jany, in 1991.
On learning of his death, Jean-Luc Mélenchon, leader of the hard left France Unbowed wrote on X that he believed in “respect for the dignity of the dead and the grief of their loved ones …” adding “this does not erase the right to judge their actions. Jean-Marie Le Pen’s actions remain intolerable. The battle against the man is over, that against hatred, racism, Islamophobia and antisemitism that he spread continues.”