As the annual Paris book fair opened on Thursday, France’s publishing world has erupted in outcry over a purge at one of the country’s most prestigious houses, Grasset, by its far-right, multi-billionaire owner Vincent Bolloré. The move by the tycoon, whose media have become a mouthpiece for the far-right, has prompted 115 authors to quit the imprint in protest, explaining that they “refuse to be the hostages of an ideological war aiming to impose authoritarianism everywhere in culture and the media”.   

A statement provided by Nicolas Sarkozy’s long-serving right-hand man and chief of staff, Claude Guéant, has severely damaged the former French president’s defence arguments at his trial on appeal against a conviction for “criminal conspiracy” in seeking election campaign funds from the regime of Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi. Guéant said Sarkozy was, contrary to his repeated denials, involved in a reciprocal move to overturn an international arrest warrant issued against Libyan military intelligence chief Abdullah Senussi, convicted in absentia of masterminding the bombing of a French airliner, killing all 170 passengers and crew aboard the flight.

Former French president Nicolas Sarkozy was last September convicted of criminal conspiracy and handed a five-year jail term for seeking illegal financing from the regime of Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi to fund his 2007 election campaign. He and fellow defendants appealed the ruling, and what is in effect their re-trial opened in March and is due to end in June. Karl Laske and Fabrice Arfi were in court last week to hear Sarkozy questioned on some of the key points of the prosecution case, when he fiercely turned against his former loyal lieutenants, arguing his innocence in face of the very real prospect of a renewed guilty verdict and prison sentence.  

To counter toughened Western sanctions imposed in 2022 on Russian oil exports in response to the country’s invasion of Ukraine that year, the Kremlin vastly expanded what has become known as its “shadow fleet” of oil tankers, made up of old vessels bought cheaply because destined for decommissioning, whose ownerships are disguised by registrations in African countries via shell companies (or are not registered at all). Estimated to now number more than 3,000 ships, the shadow fleet brings in vital revenue for Russia’s war effort. In this report, Mediapart’s media partner, The Kyiv Independent, reveals how the vessels communicate using US internet provider Starlink, and how Ukrainian nationals are among the crews, lured by “easy money” paid in cryptocurrency.

The head of the luxury goods group LVMH has just bought an enormous new motor yacht even bigger and even more expensive than his existing one. It has been acquired through a company registered in Malta, as was his current yacht, the Symphony. The estimated price of the new vessel is more than half a billion euros.

The alleged discovery of drugs in the handbag of Rima Hassan, a Member of the European Parliament for the radical-left La France Insoumise (LFI) party and prominent pro-Palestinian activist, has made headlines in France. But this controversy has overshadowed the main issue of the case against her: a tweet quoting the words of a Japanese terrorist jailed over the massacre of 26 people at an Israeli airport in 1972. The MEP will stand trial in July for “condoning terrorism”, with LFI attacking what it calls “judicial and political persecution”. Some see it as part of an attempt to “silence” pro-Palestinian activists.

At the court of appeal in Paris the former French president and other defendants are currently challenging their convictions over the Libyan funding affair handed down at a criminal trial last September. The in-flight bombing of a French airliner over Africa in 1989, in which 170 people died, forms a grim backdrop to the claims that Nicolas Sarkozy and his close allies took part in a secret plan to seek funds for his 2007 election campaign from the regime of Libya's dictator Muammar Gaddafi. As part of this alleged plan, Sarkozy's aides met Abdullah Senussi, a senior regime figure convicted in his absence for organising that terrorist attack. Families of victims of the 1989 attack are civil parties to the case and in court this week they said they want answers about the negotiations that took place between Sarkozy’s office and Senussi.

The many tens of thousands of self-employed community nurses and home carers working across France are on the front line when it comes to caring for patients and the vulnerable at home. Yet despite the huge mileage many of them do each week, the French government's recent 69-million-euro relief package to combat rising fuel prices does not include them. Meanwhile, the steep increase in the cost of petrol and diesel caused by the US-Israeli attack war on Iran continues to cut deep into their income. One union now warns that nurses may soon have to choose which patients to look after.

A Paris court will this Monday start hearing a case featuring military personnel from the French external secret service, former agents from the country's domestic intelligence agency, greedy Freemasons, ruthless company bosses and a list of crimes stretching all the way up to murder. This case, known as the 'Athanor affair', and set to last more than three months, will highlight a lawless world of business where the phrase “eliminating the competition” can sometimes mean exactly that.