Paris - French author Maurice Druon, a former culture minister and fighter for France's World War II resistance movement, died Tuesday aged 90, the Academie francaise announced. Druon, author of numerous novels, was hailed by President Nicolas Sarkozy as "grand scribe and a grand soul."
He is best known for Les Rois Maudits, or The Accused Kings, a series of historical novels published in the 1950s.
Paris - A gunman wielding a hunting rifle shot two people to death outside his house in the northern French town of Douchy-les- Mines, France Info radio reported Monday. The 63-year-old gunman, a retired lorry driver, fled into his residence after the shootings, but surrendered to police several hours later. Earlier reports spoke of three people killed.
The victims were identified as a young couple who were about to visit the gunman's neighbours.
Paris - Worse-than-expected prospects for the world economy has prompted the International Energy Agency (IEA) to again revise downward global oil demand for 2009. In its Monthly Oil Report, issued Friday in Paris, the IEA said that "after a flurry of downward adjustments by both public and private forecasters," oil demand for 2009 has been revised down by 1 million barrels per day, to 83.4 million barrels per day.
This is a drop of 2.8 per cent compared to 2008, the IEA said.
Paris- French workers for a British adhesives maker who held their managers hostage were granted twice as much redundancy pay as had been offered before the boss-napping, France Info radio reported Thursday.
The 68 employees at the factory in the south-eastern French town of Bellegarde have will now receive 1.7 million euros (2.27 million dollars) in redundancy payments by the British group Scapa after they held captive four managers who had come to negotiate the shutdown of the site.
Paris - The press freedom watchdog Reporters Without Borders Wednesday strongly criticized the Algerian government's decision to ban three French publications in the run-up to Thursday's election.
"This censorship is disgraceful," the group said in a statement about the repression of the current issues of the weeklies L'Express, Marianne and Le Journal du Dimanche.
The ban "constitutes a denial of press freedom and therefore a denial of democracy," the organization said.
Paris - French author Maurice Druon, a former culture minister and fighter for France's World War II resistance movement, died Tuesday aged 90, the Academie francaise announced. Druon, author of numerous novels, was hailed by President Nicolas Sarkozy as "grand scribe and a grand soul."
Paris - A gunman wielding a hunting rifle shot two people to death outside his house in the northern French town of Douchy-les- Mines, France Info radio reported Monday. The 63-year-old gunman, a retired lorry driver, fled into his residence after the shootings, but surrendered to police several hours later. Earlier reports spoke of three people killed.
Paris - Worse-than-expected prospects for the world economy has prompted the International Energy Agency (IEA) to again revise downward global oil demand for 2009. In its Monthly Oil Report, issued Friday in Paris, the IEA said that "after a flurry of downward adjustments by both public and private forecasters," oil demand for 2009 has been revised down by 1 million barrels per day, to 83.4 million barrels per day.
Paris- French workers for a British adhesives maker who held their managers hostage were granted twice as much redundancy pay as had been offered before the boss-napping, France Info radio reported Thursday.
Paris - The press freedom watchdog Reporters Without Borders Wednesday strongly criticized the Algerian government's decision to ban three French publications in the run-up to Thursday's election.
