Hermann Fuster, the man who assaulted Nicolas Sarkozy in June, has apologized in the media, saying he never meant to attack the president. He has said the incident has convinced him to stop smoking marijuana.

"/> Hermann Fuster, the man who assaulted Nicolas Sarkozy in June, has apologized in the media, saying he never meant to attack the president. He has said the incident has convinced him to stop smoking marijuana.

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CRIME

Sarkozy attacker apologizes to president

Hermann Fuster, the man who assaulted Nicolas Sarkozy in June, has apologized in the media, saying he never meant to attack the president. He has said the incident has convinced him to stop smoking marijuana.

Fuster, 32, who was given a six-month suspended jail sentence for grabbing the French leader’s jacket during a meet-and-greet session on June 30th and almost pulling him to the ground, gave interviews with several media outlets saying he “sincerely regrets” his actions and that he “is not a violent person.”

“I first tried to shake his hand … then I wanted to tap him on the shoulder,” Fuster said in an interview with website 20minutes.fr. “But the second I touched his suit, the guards behind me grabbed me and threw me back.”

He said he grabbed hold of Sarkozy’s jacket to keep from falling “like anyone would who is toppling over” and the French leader was dragged down with him.

Sarkozy had come to the south-western French town of Brax to attend a meeting of mayors and welcome back two French hostages who had been released after 18 months in Taliban captivity. During the incident, he would have likely fallen to the ground had he not been able to catch himself on a metal barricade.

The president was quickly surrounded by stunned bodyguards who also immediately immobilized Fuster, a caretaker and receptionist at a local conservatory in the nearby town of Agen. He is currently on suspension from his job.

The president himself did not press charges although Fuster could have received a three-year sentence and had to pay tens of thousands in fines for assaulting a public figure. It was the first time Sarkozy had been physically assaulted at close quarters.

Despite the media circus and the job suspension, Fuster said there has been a silver lining.

“I’ve stopped smoking cannabis and I go out now with friends instead of staying home by myself,” he said, adding that he didn’t want to become a poster-child for anti-Sarkozy forces.

Still, he did have a message for the president.

“I would tell him to listen to the people who elected him,” he told newspaper Le Parisien. “I didn’t vote for him myself, but I have to think about all those workers who believed his promises and who are disappointed today.”

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CRIME

France blocks fake Ukraine war recruitment website

French authorities have uncovered a website for a fake recruitment drive purportedly seeking French volunteers to fight for Ukraine against the Russian invasion, the defence ministry said on Thursday.

France blocks fake Ukraine war recruitment website

The site has now been taken down by French services, a government source, who asked not to be named, told AFP without elaborating.

The site had said that 200,000 French people were invited to “enlist in Ukraine”, with immigrants given priority.

A link to the site – that resembled the French army’s genuine recruitment portal – had been posted on X, formerly Twitter, the French defence ministry said.

“The site is a fake government site,” the ministry said, also on X, “and has been reposted by malevolent accounts as part of a disinformation campaign”.

The ministry did not say who they thought might be responsible. But a source close to the government told AFP initial evidence pointed to communications operations linked to Russian mercenary group Wagner.

“The accounts used and the technical data behind them, these are the people we know”, the source said.

“These people are still there and remain very focused on Ukraine. The subject of the French army is something that annoys them a lot.”

Separately, a government official speaking on condition of anonymity said the site bore “the hallmarks of a Russian or pro-Russian effort as part of a disinformation campaign claiming that the French army is preparing to send troops to Ukraine”.

French President Emmanuel Macron angered the Russian leadership last month by hardening his tone on the conflict sparked by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

In recent weeks he has refused to rule out sending ground troops and insisted that Europe has to do all that is necessary for a Russian defeat.

France has already accused Russia of waging a disinformation campaign against it.

The official told AFP that similar recent examples of disinformation posts included pictures of French army convoys wrongly presented as moving towards the Ukrainian border.

The fake website invited potential recruits to contact “unit commander Paul” for information about joining.

The defence ministry and government cyber units are investigating, ministry staff told AFP.

The French government has recently stepped up efforts to denounce and fight what it says are Russian disinformation and destabilisation campaigns aimed at undermining French public support for Ukraine in its war against Russia.

“Russia is asserting itself as the most aggressive player in the information field,” Marc-Antoine Brillant, the head of Viginum, an agency mandated to detect digital disinformation campaigns, said in an interview with French daily Le Figaro.

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