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Femen activists disrupt May Day speech by Marine Le Pen
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(16 days later)
The far-right Front National’s traditional Paris May Day rally was disrupted by women from the Femen activist group, who made mock-Nazi salutes from a balcony and disrupted a speech by Marine Le Pen before they were violently pulled away by three men.
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The topless activists, who wore blonde wigs and had “Heil Le Pen” and “Stop fascism” written across their chests, unfurled banners linking the party’s logo with the Nazi party. They chanted anti-Front National slogans to boos from the crowd during its annual tribute to the 15th-century figure Joan of Arc.
For five minutes, they drowned out Le Pen’s speech with a bullhorn as the Front National leader told the crowd: “It’s quite a paradox when you call yourself a feminist and try to disturb a tribute to Joan of Arc.” Three men, reportedly from the party’s security services, were then seen forcefully pulling the women inside before one of the men raised his fist to the crowd in an apparent sign of victory.
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Related: Le Pen family feud is a battle for the soul of the Front National – and France
“They will be forced to get dressed,” Le Pen then said of the protesters as she resumed her speech.
The Femen activists, who were later arrested, are to file a legal complaint for violence, break-in and arbitrary arrest, their lawyer told French media.
Meanwhile, the May Day rally proved awkward for Le Pen on another level, too. The gathering came days before a party disciplinary meeting on Monday to which her father, the party co-founder and honorary president, Jean-Marie Le Pen, has been summoned over inflammatory remarks belittling the Holocaust and defending Marshal Pétain, the leader of France’s Nazi collaborationist Vichy regime.
The rift between father and daughter was played out at the rally as the older Le Pen, 86, was not scheduled to make his usual speech from the podium.
Instead, after Marine Le Pen had laid a wreath before the statue of Joan of Arc, he approached the statue and dramatically cried out to Joan of Arc for help. Later, once Marine had taken to the stage to begin her speech, he unexpectedly stood in front of the platform with outstretched arms to cheers from the crowd. He and his daughter did not exchange words and she looked stoney-faced.
Positioning herself for a presidential bid in 2017, Marine Le Pen used her speech to take aim at the Socialist François Hollande’s handling of the economy, rising unemployment, as well as the return to politics of the rightwing Nicolas Sarkozy.
In a speech peppered with lines about the dangers of immigration and Islamism, she said: “They have allowed massive immigration to install itself in France. They have unpinned the Islamic fundamentalist grenade.” She said of the Front National, which has had a series of electoral successes on an anti-immigration, anti-Europe and protectionist platform: “We are right on everything.”
It is not clear what sanctions Jean-Marie Le Pen faces at the closed-door meeting of the party executive. He has already agreed to give up his ambitions to be the Front National candidate for the crucial southern area of Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur in regional elections later this year, replaced by his granddaughter, the Front National MP, Marion Maréchal-Le Pen.
