French President Jacques Chirac's closest ally and chosen heir, the former prime minister, Alain Juppe, vowed on Tuesday night to stay in politics and fight a corruption conviction that has shaken the French president and his ruling center-right party.
As three separate inquiries were launched into alleged dirty tricks against the judges who sentenced him, Juppe -- mayor of Bordeaux, a member of parliament, and chairman of Chirac's UMP party -- said he had appealed against the conviction and "since the appeal suspends the sentence, I will continue in my duties."
Juppe said his first instinct had been to "turn the page" and quit politics, but he had since reconsidered. The decision affords Chirac some respite by averting an immediate and potentially catastrophic UMP power struggle.
PHOTO: AFP
But that battle is only deferred: Juppe said he would not stand for re-election as the head of the party at polls in November. Nonetheless, if the appeal is successful, there remains a slim hope for Chirac that his most loyal lieutenant may yet succeed him.
A Nanterre court on Friday gave Juppe an 18-month suspended sentence and banned him from holding elected office for a decade, finding him guilty of using Paris taxpayers' money to pay the salaries of full-time staff from Chirac's previous party, the RPR.
If the verdict rocked the right, the extraordinary shower of praise for Juppe from his Gaullist allies has prompted widespread criticism that France's political elite cannot accept it should be subject to the same justice as voters.
The president of the French magistrates' union, Dominique Barella, said yesterday the campaign by Juppe's allies showed France was "still, democratically, a developing country whose elected officials have yet to absorb the notion of judicial independence."
Liberation called such declarations -- and attacks on the justice system -- as "unworthy of a genuine democracy," while Le Monde branded them "stupefying."
Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin said he was "surprised" at the verdict, which was "only provisional," and that France "needs men like Alain Juppe."
A senior UMP senator, Josselin de Rohan, professed himself "indignant that a man of such quality should be treated as a wrongdoer," and the deputy speaker of the National Assembly, Eric Raoult, called the verdict as "disproportionate, hypocritical and cynical."
In what amounts to a concerted challenge to the judicial system, the president's wife, Bernadette, has chimed in, describing Juppe as "a great statesman," while Chirac called a "politician of an exceptional quality of competence, humanity ... and honesty."
Noel Mamere, a Green member of parliament , said the right in general, and the president in particular, were "giving an extremely bad impression of France ... We look like a banana republic."
Juppe, 58, was both RPR chairman and responsible for Paris town hall's finances during much of the period from 1978 to 1995, when Chirac was mayor.
His conviction is seen as a condemnation of the entire illegal party financing system allegedly masterminded by Chirac to turn the town hall into a launch pad for his presidency.
Airlines in Australia, Hong Kong, India, Malaysia and Singapore yesterday canceled flights to and from the Indonesian island of Bali, after a nearby volcano catapulted an ash tower into the sky. Australia’s Jetstar, Qantas and Virgin Australia all grounded flights after Mount Lewotobi Laki-Laki on Flores island spewed a 9km tower a day earlier. Malaysia Airlines, AirAsia, India’s IndiGo and Singapore’s Scoot also listed flights as canceled. “Volcanic ash poses a significant threat to safe operations of the aircraft in the vicinity of volcanic clouds,” AirAsia said as it announced several cancelations. Multiple eruptions from the 1,703m twin-peaked volcano in
China has built a land-based prototype nuclear reactor for a large surface warship, in the clearest sign yet Beijing is advancing toward producing the nation’s first nuclear-powered aircraft carrier, according to a new analysis of satellite imagery and Chinese government documents provided to The Associated Press. There have long been rumors that China is planning to build a nuclear-powered aircraft carrier, but the research by the Middlebury Institute of International Studies in California is the first to confirm it is working on a nuclear-powered propulsion system for a carrier-sized surface warship. Why is China’s pursuit of nuclear-powered carriers significant? China’s navy is already
Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) launched a week-long diplomatic blitz of South America on Thursday by inaugurating a massive deep-water port in Peru, a US$1.3 billion investment by Beijing as it seeks to expand trade and influence on the continent. With China’s demand for agricultural goods and metals from Latin America growing, Xi will participate in the APEC summit in Lima then head to the Group of 20 summit in Rio de Janeiro next week, where he will also make a state visit to Brazil. Xi and Peruvian President Dina Boluarte participated on Thursday by video link in the opening
IT’S A DEAL? Including the phrase ‘overlapping claims’ in a Chinese-Indonesian joint statement over the weekend puts Jakarta’s national interests at risk, critics say Indonesia yesterday said it does not recognize China’s claims over the South China Sea, despite signing a maritime development deal with Beijing, as some analysts warned the pact risked compromising its sovereign rights. Beijing has long clashed with Southeast Asian neighbors over the South China Sea, which it claims almost in its entirety, based on a “nine-dash line” on its maps that cuts into the exclusive economic zones (EEZ) of several countries. Joint agreements with China in the strategic waterway have been sensitive for years, with some nations wary of deals they fear could be interpreted as legitimizing Beijing’s vast claims. In 2016,
RSS