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Le Pen urges French to ‘inflict scathing electoral sanction’ on Macron

Leader of the hard-right Rassemblement National party Marine Le Pen called on the French on Wednesday to “inflict” on Emmanuel Macron “the most scathing electoral sanction” possible during the European election ballot on June 9th.

Published: 1 May 2024 16:01 CEST

Marine Le Pen, parliamentary party leader of the National Rally in the French Assembly, delivers a speech during a campaign meeting for the forthcoming European union (EU) parliamentary elections scheduled for June 2024, in Perpignan, on May 1, 2024. (Photo by Ed JONES / AFP)

“We must counter them, we must sanction them, we must dismiss them,” said Le Pen, speaking from the podium of a major meeting of her party in Perpignan.

“We must give this power the most scathing electoral sanction that can be inflicted on it. And this sanction will be measured by the gap between the list led by [Rassemblement National president] Jordan Bardella and that of the Macronist deconstructors,” she added.

For now, Bardella’s Rassemblement National (RN) list is far ahead of Macron’s Renaissance list led by Valérie Hayer: 32 percent against 17 percent, according to an Ipsos survey published on Monday.

“This election of June 9 constitutes (…) a call for general mobilisation,” said Le Pen in her speech.

“No abstentions, but no dispersion either,” she said, warning voters who could be tempted by other candidates on the right, in particular that of Marion Maréchal (Reconquête) on the far right.

“One day, one round, one vote: Bardella,” she added.

Speaking to over 2,000 activists gathered in the largest city led by the RN, Le Pen called on her troops not to “give in to intellectual terrorism” on the subject of the European Union.

“We are right to be critical. We are right to want something different for Europe and for France and for ourselves,” she said, admitting to wanting to “say no” on certain themes, such as “migratory submersion”, “the destruction of our economy in the name of ecological decline” or the “technocratic government of Brussels or elsewhere”.

France goes to vote on June 9th to elect 81 members (nearly one seventh of the total) of the European Parliament.

Jordan Bardella tops the National Rally’s list, Marion Maréchal is leading Eric Zemmour’s Reconquête list, Valérie Hayer is leading the European elections campaign for Macron’s Renaissance party and Raphael Glucksmann is the lead candidate for the Socialists.

Recent polls point to support in the high teens for Macron’s centrist party, well below the far-right National Rally at around 30 percent, while the Socialists are snapping at the presidential camp’s heels for second place.

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Azerbaijan vehemently rejects the accusation it bears responsibility for the riots that have led to the deaths of five people and rattled the Paris government.

But it is just the latest in a litany of tensions between Paris and Baku and not the first time France has accused Azerbaijan of being behind an alleged disinformation campaign.

The riots in New Caledonia, a French territory lying between Australia and Fiji, were sparked by moves to agree a new voting law that supporters of independence from France say discriminates against the indigenous Kanak population.

Paris points to the sudden emergence of Azerbaijani flags alongside Kanak symbols in the protests, while a group linked to the Baku authorities is openly backing separatists while condemning Paris.

“This isn’t a fantasy. It’s a reality,” interior minister Gérald Darmanin told television channel France 2 when asked if Azerbaijan, China and Russia were interfering in New Caledonia.

“I regret that some of the Caledonian pro-independence leaders have made a deal with Azerbaijan. It’s indisputable,” he alleged.

But he added: “Even if there are attempts at interference… France is sovereign on its own territory, and so much the better”.

“We completely reject the baseless accusations,” Azerbaijan’s foreign ministry spokesman Ayhan Hajizadeh said.

“We refute any connection between the leaders of the struggle for freedom in Caledonia and Azerbaijan.”

In images widely shared on social media, a reportage broadcast Wednesday on the French channel TF1 showed some pro-independence supporters wearing T-shirts adorned with the Azerbaijani flag.

Tensions between Paris and Baku have grown in the wake of the 2020 war and 2023 lightning offensive that Azerbaijan waged to regain control of its breakaway Nagorno-Karabakh region from ethnic Armenian separatists.

France is a traditional ally of Christian Armenia, Azerbaijan’s neighbour and historic rival, and is also home to a large Armenian diaspora.

Darmanin said Azerbaijan – led since 2003 by President Ilham Aliyev, who succeeded his father Heydar – was a “dictatorship”.

On Wednesday, the Paris government also banned social network TikTok from operating in New Caledonia.

Tiktok, whose parent company is Chinese, has been widely used by protesters. Critics fear it is being employed to spread disinformation coming from foreign countries.

Azerbaijan invited separatists from the French territories of Martinique, French Guiana, New Caledonia and French Polynesia to Baku for a conference in July 2023.

The meeting saw the creation of the “Baku Initiative Group”, whose stated aim is to support “French liberation and anti-colonialist movements”.

The group published a statement this week condemning the French parliament’s proposed change to New Caledonia’s constitution, which would allow outsiders who moved to the territory at least 10 years ago the right to vote in its elections.

Pro-independence forces say that would dilute the vote of Kanaks, who make up about 40 percent of the population.

“We stand in solidarity with our Kanak friends and support their fair struggle,” the Baku Initiative Group said.

Raphael Glucksmann, the lawmaker heading the list for the French Socialists in June’s European Parliament elections, told Public Senat television that Azerbaijan had made “attempts to interfere… for months”.

He said the underlying problem behind the unrest was a domestic dispute over election reform, not agitation fomented by “foreign actors”.

But he accused Azerbaijan of “seizing on internal problems.”

A French government source, who asked not to be named, said pro-Azerbaijani social media accounts had on Wednesday posted an edited montage purporting to show two white police officers with rifles aimed at dead Kanaks.

“It’s a pretty massive campaign, with around 4,000 posts generated by (these) accounts,” the source told AFP.

“They are reusing techniques already used during a previous smear campaign called Olympia.”

In November, France had already accused actors linked to Azerbaijan of carrying out a disinformation campaign aimed at damaging its reputation over its ability to host the Olympic Games in Paris. Baku also rejected these accusations.