Paris - Segolene Royal, the defeated Socialist Party candidate in last year's French presidential election, said Wednesday that she wanted to replace her former partner as party chief.

Asked if she would be a candidate for party leader, she told TF 1 television, "I will tell you frankly: it's true that I want to (head the party)."

The Socialist Party will elect a successor to the current party secretary Francois Hollande on November 20, following the party congress, which is due to begin Friday in the city of Reims.

Paris - Seven people were injured, two of them seriously, when an explosion ripped through the dormitory room of a student at a university in the southern French city of Montpellier early Wednesday, French media reported.

The victims were identified as students from eastern Europe. France-Info radio reported that one of them, a native of Russia, was in a coma and in grave condition.

Madrid  - French police Wednesday detained two suspected members of the militant Basque separatist group ETA, Spanish police sources said.

The two were captured during a routine police check as they were cycling near Tarascon-sur-Ariege in the south of the country. They were armed with a pistol and a revolver.

The suspects had documents related to ETA in their bags, the sources said. They also carried fake identity documents.

Madrid - French police Wednesday detained two suspected members of the militant Basque se

Paris - After denying that it had lost nearly 1 billion euros (1.26 billion dollars) in trading last month, French investment bank Natixis on Wednesday said it had incurred losses of about one fourth that amount.

In a statement, Natixis said its trading losses for October totalled about 250 million euros and were due to an "extremely difficult (market) that was without precedent for its activities."

The investment bank also said it had made provisions of another 250 million euros in October because of the risks associated with the finance crisis.

Paris - Ten people arrested for a recent series of attacks on French railway lines are said to belong to a small left-wing extremist group intent on carrying out acts of disruption, French media reported on Wednesday.

Five of the 10 suspects - including the alleged leader of the group, a 34-year-old names Julien - were living in a small village in the department, or region, of Correze in central France when they were taken into custody early Tuesday. Others were arrested in Paris and Rouen.