French and Riviera News Friday 12th May 2023

News

French prosecutors are seeking to send former President Nicolas Sarkozy and 13 others to trial - The French national financial prosecutor’s office has announced its to seek a trial which would see former French President Nicolas Sarkozy and 13 others face charges that his 2007 presidential campaign received millions in illegal financing from the government of late Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi. After a decade of investigation, it's now up to judges to determine whether to move ahead. In general, judges in France follow such prosecutors' requests, though not always. The case is the biggest and most shocking of multiple corruption investigations involving Sarkozy. He has been convicted in two others. He denies wrongdoing in all cases.

Reindustrialisation of France - In other news, French President Emmanuel Macron has presented his measures to accelerate the reindustrialisation of France at the Elysée Palace on Thursday. Macron also promised an additional 700 million euros to develop training for “jobs of the future” and announced the creation of a “green industry tax credit to support the production of batteries, heat pumps, wind turbines or solar panels. The Head of State also called on the European Union to give a “European regulatory break” in terms of environmental constraints, believing that they were already stricter than elsewhere, and that stability was now needed. The Elysée said “the president is not talking about suspension, but about executing the decisions alrea