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	<title>WorldCategory: France &#124; World &#124; TIME.com</title>
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		<title>WorldCategory: France &#124; World &#124; TIME.com</title>
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		<title>French President Signs Gay Marriage Into Law</title>
		<link>http://world.time.com/2013/05/18/french-president-signs-gay-marriage-into-law/</link>
		<comments>http://world.time.com/2013/05/18/french-president-signs-gay-marriage-into-law/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Sat, 18 May 2013 13:26:31 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Associated Press</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[France]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://world.time.com/?p=86847</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[(PARIS) — French President Francois Hollande has signed a law authorizing gay marriage and adoption by same-sex couples, after months of nationwide protests and wrenching debate. His signature means the first gay marriages may be celebrated in France within about 10 days. Hollande&#8217;s office said he signed the bill Saturday morning, a day after the Constitutional Council struck down a challenge to the law. Hollande, a Socialist, had made legalizing gay marriage one of his campaign pledges last year. While polls for years have shown majority support for gay marriage in France, adoption by same-sex couples is more controversial. The bill prompted months of widespread protests, largely by conservative and religious groups. Some were marred by clashes with police. It became a flashpoint for frustrations at the increasingly unpopular Hollande. MORE: France’s Lower House Pushes Through Gay-Marriage Legalization — Now What?<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=world.time.com&#038;blog=19871253&#038;post=86847&#038;subd=timeglobalspin&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
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	<primary_category>France</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://world.time.com/category/europe/france/</primary_category_link>
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		<title>France Confirms 1st Case of New SARS-related Virus</title>
		<link>http://world.time.com/2013/05/08/france-confirms-1st-case-of-new-sars-related-virus/</link>
		<comments>http://world.time.com/2013/05/08/france-confirms-1st-case-of-new-sars-related-virus/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Wed, 08 May 2013 14:41:53 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>AP / Angela Charlton</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[France]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://world.time.com/?p=85587</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[(PARIS) — A 65-year-old Frenchman is hospitalized after contracting France&#8216;s first case of a deadly new respiratory virus related to SARS, and French health authorities said Wednesday they are trying to find anyone who might have been in contact with him to prevent it from spreading. It&#8217;s unclear how or where the man was infected with the novel coronavirus, which has killed 18 people and raised new public health concerns since being identified last year in the Middle East. It can cause acute pneumonia and kidney failure. The patient fell ill after returning from a nine-day vacation in Dubai in the United Arab Emirates as part of a package tour, the Health Ministry said. Jean-Yves Grall, the French government health director, said the patient is in &#8220;worrying condition&#8221; under isolation and medical surveillance, receiving respiratory assistance and blood transfusions. The man, whose identity was not released, returned from Dubai on April 17. He was hospitalized with respiratory problems in the northern French city of Valenciennes on April 23, and transferred to a more advanced facility in Douai on April 29, Grall told a news conference Wednesday. Paris&#8217; Pasteur Institute analyzed the man&#8217;s virus and confirmed Tuesday that it is a novel coronavirus. Since September 2012, the World Health Organization has been informed of 30 confirmed cases of the virus, and 18 of the patients have died. Cases have emerged in Saudi Arabia, Jordan, the UAE, Qatar, Britain and Germany, and health officials say the virus has likely already spread from person to person in some circumstances. Since the virus emerged last year, European authorities have put in place monitoring measures. In France, 20 people were examined for suspected cases of the virus, and the other 19 turned up negative, Health Minister Marisol Touraine said. (MORE: After SARS: A New Virus in Saudi Arabia Underscores the Need to Police Disease in Animals) The patient who traveled to Dubai is the only positive case. His family members have been tested and are not infected, the Health Ministry said, and the other travelers in<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=world.time.com&#038;blog=19871253&#038;post=85587&#038;subd=timeglobalspin&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
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	<primary_category>France</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://world.time.com/category/europe/france/</primary_category_link>
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		<title>France&#8217;s Latest Terrorist Suspect: A French Convert Near Retirement Age</title>
		<link>http://world.time.com/2013/05/02/soldiers-in-mali-arrest-french-terrorist-jihadi-convert/</link>
		<comments>http://world.time.com/2013/05/02/soldiers-in-mali-arrest-french-terrorist-jihadi-convert/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Thu, 02 May 2013 06:00:51 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Bruce Crumley / Paris</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Africa]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Al-Qaeda]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Conflict]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Europe]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[France]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Islam]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Mali]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Military]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Morocco]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[religion]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Terrorism]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[al Qaeda in Islamic Maghreb]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[bamako]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[jihad]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[mali]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Mohammed Merah]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[security]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[terrorism]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://world.time.com/?p=84717</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[France’s newest prisoner in the fight against terrorism does not fit the profile of the modern jihadi that French investigators have, in recent years, broadly focused on — that of a young, disaffected man. Gilles Le Guen, a French convert to radical Islam who was arrested by French forces on April 28 in northern Mali, is 58. When last seen in an online video uploaded in October 2012, Le Guen — who also went by the name Abdel Jelil — was declaring his allegiance to the Islamist group Al-Qaeda in Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) and threatening his homeland with retaliation if France intervened against his fellow extremists who had taken control of northern Mali. Both his look and message raised many eyebrows among security officials back in France. Many aspiring jihadis in Europe begin the radicalization process at home before seeking instruction and combat training from radical groups abroad. Le Guen, by contrast, veered to extremism only once AQIM-allied militias stormed northern Mali — an area where he’d quietly lived, approaching retirement age, with his wife and children for two years. (MORE: Jihadi Strike in Timbuktu Reflects Altered Terrorism Threat in Mali) “The average case involves a younger man leaving for a zone where jihadi activity — usually combat — is already under way, not waiting for jihad to come to the door,” says a senior French antiterrorism official who spoke on the condition of anonymity and who notes several French nationals are known to have traveled to Mali to fight aside AQIM-linked militias. “[Le Guen] lived as a convert to Islam in Timbuktu as a pious husband and father, and only radicalized once extremists took control of the region. He’s the polar opposite of [Toulouse jihadi killer] Mohammed Merah.” That late-in-life transformation is what appears to have inspired Le Guen’s October video, in which he warns France and other nations to halt plans for the military intervention that in January drove the Frenchman&#8217;s fellow Islamists out of northern Mali. It’s still unclear to French security officials, however, whether Le Guen actually took<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=world.time.com&#038;blog=19871253&#038;post=84717&#038;subd=timeglobalspin&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
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		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
	<primary_category>Terrorism</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://world.time.com/category/terrorism/</primary_category_link><featured_image>http://timeglobalspin.files.wordpress.com/2013/01/march20.jpg?w=240</featured_image>
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			<media:title type="html">Mali Fighting</media:title>
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			<media:title type="html">girondins33</media:title>
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		<title>3 Killed in French Building Collapse After Blast</title>
		<link>http://world.time.com/2013/04/28/3-killed-in-french-building-collapse-after-blast/</link>
		<comments>http://world.time.com/2013/04/28/3-killed-in-french-building-collapse-after-blast/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Sun, 28 Apr 2013 19:07:53 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>AP / Milos Krivokapic</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[France]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://world.time.com/?p=84154</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[(REIMS, France) — A possible gas explosion ripped off the side of a five-story residential building in France&#8217;s Champagne country on Sunday, killing at least three people and injuring 14 others, officials said. More than 100 rescue workers, firefighters, sniffer-dog squads and bomb and gas experts were deployed to the gutted building in a subsidized housing complex in the city of Reims, east of Paris, officials said. Heaps of debris spilled out of the building onto a grassy esplanade below. &#8220;The explosion of a residential building in Reims is a terrible drama,&#8221; the office of French President Francois Hollande said in a statement, conveying his condolences to the victims&#8217; relatives. (PHOTOS: Hundreds Dead as Garment Factory in Bangladesh Collapses) Michel Bernard, the top government official in Reims, said crews searching for survivors turned up the body of a woman under the rubble Sunday afternoon, raising the death toll to three. He said it was unlikely that the toll would rise any higher. Through most of the day, authorities had said at least two people had died. One person was hospitalized with serious, but not life-threatening injuries, and another 13 people had minor injuries, officials said. Authorities used backhoes to help clear away the rubble. &#8220;We don&#8217;t know the cause of the explosion. It was probably due to gas,&#8221; Reims mayor Adeline Hazan said at the scene. An official investigation was under way to determine the cause, she said. Authorities say the three people known to have died were adults. Witnesses described a powerful blast. &#8220;The explosion was very strong, like a sonic boom from a fighter plane. We had been playing football on a field about 30 meters (100 feet) away, and ran to the scene,&#8221; housing project resident Abdel Kader said. &#8220;The building had fallen like a house of cards &#8230; 30 seconds after that we saw a man calling for help, he was on a slab. His legs were caught.&#8221; &#8220;Later, he died,&#8221; Abdel Kader, a 27-year-old job seeker who declined to provide his family name, said. Bernard, the<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=world.time.com&#038;blog=19871253&#038;post=84154&#038;subd=timeglobalspin&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
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		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
	<primary_category>France</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://world.time.com/category/europe/france/</primary_category_link>
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			<media:title type="html">timeassociatedpress</media:title>
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		<title>Publisher, Photographer Probed over Kate Photos</title>
		<link>http://world.time.com/2013/04/25/publisher-photographer-probed-over-kate-photos/</link>
		<comments>http://world.time.com/2013/04/25/publisher-photographer-probed-over-kate-photos/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Thu, 25 Apr 2013 10:40:20 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>AP / THOMAS ADAMSON</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[France]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://world.time.com/?p=83831</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[(PARIS) &#8212; French prosecutors have placed the publisher and photographer of unauthorized topless snaps of Prince William&#8217;s wife, Kate, under formal criminal investigation, they said Thursday. Caroline Chassain, spokeswoman for the Nanterre prosecutor, said that Mondadori Magazines France and local photographer Valerie Suau were placed under investigation earlier this month over possible criminal exploitation of the images, which appeared in the French &#8220;Closer&#8221; magazine last September. (MORE: Topless Kate Middleton Photos Published by French Magazine) The photos showed the Duchess of Cambridge relaxing at a private villa in Provence, in southern France, sometimes without her bikini top and, in one case, her suit bottom partially pulled down to apply sunscreen. Chassain added that Suau&#8217;s employer, local newspaper &#8220;La Provence,&#8221; was also placed under formal criminal investigation on Monday, but she did not elaborate. The investigation will likely take months to complete. The blurry photos have been called a &#8220;grotesque and totally unjustifiable&#8221; abuse of privacy by British royal officials. Despite efforts by Prince William and Kate to halt their use last September they went on to be published in Italy, Ireland, Sweden and on the Internet. However, no major British publication carried the photos, including Rupert Murdoch&#8217;s top-selling U.K. tabloid The Sun, which last year ran photos of a naked Prince Harry cavorting in a Las Vegas hotel room. The first major press incident involving William and Kate brought back memories of William&#8217;s mother Diana being hounded by paparazzi in France in the hours and days before her fatal car crash there in 1997.<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=world.time.com&#038;blog=19871253&#038;post=83831&#038;subd=timeglobalspin&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
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	<primary_category>France</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://world.time.com/category/europe/france/</primary_category_link>
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		<title>France Legalizes Gay Marriage Despite Vocal and Angry Opposition</title>
		<link>http://world.time.com/2013/04/23/france-legalizes-same-sex-marriage/</link>
		<comments>http://world.time.com/2013/04/23/france-legalizes-same-sex-marriage/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 23 Apr 2013 18:01:35 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Bruce Crumley</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Democracy]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Europe]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[France]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Gender]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Human rights]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[religion]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[U.K.]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[U.S.]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[adoption]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[extreme-right]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[François Hollande]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[gay marriage]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[gay rights]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Nicolas Sarkozy]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[paris]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://world.time.com/?p=83489</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Controversial legislation establishing marriage and adoption rights for same-sex couples cleared final passage in France on April 23 after a 331-to-225 vote in the left-controlled Parliament. But the protests it has prompted in recent months aren’t likely to fade any time soon. As France’s opposition conservatives promise to mount legal challenges to block the law’s application, leaders of the well-organized and vocal groups who’ve fought the measure will continue denouncing it as an attack on matrimony and the traditional family unit. The French lower house of Parliament on Tuesday passed the so-called Marriage for All bill, which opens marriage and adoption to same-sex couples with identical rights previously limited to heterosexual unions. That vote — which was largely split down left-right lines — makes France the ninth E.U. member and the 14th nation in the world to legalize same-sex marriage. Opponents decried the legislation — which was one of Socialist President François Hollande’s main campaign promises — as deforming time-honored definitions of marriage and endangering children by permitting gay and lesbian couples to adopt. French public opinion was mixed: polls have consistently shown around 60% of people favoring legalization of same-sex marriage, with a small majority opposed to adoption rights accompanying that reform. (MORE: Is Gay Marriage Too Progressive for the French?) Indeed, given France’s rather liberal, live-and-let-live social reputation abroad, it struck some foreign observers as ironic the French took so long — and battled so bitterly — to legalize same-sex marriage that purportedly stodgier “Anglo-Saxon” countries like the U.S. and U.K. now appear to be moving toward rapidly. Be that as it may, backers of Marriage for All cheered its final passage — and expect, once the law clears constitutional review in late May, the first legal same-sex marriages to be performed in June. “It’s a generous law, and a law of equality,” an elated Christiane Taubira, Socialist Justice Minister and author of the bill, told Parliament after the vote. “We believe the first weddings will be beautiful and that they&#8217;ll bring a breeze of joy, and that those who<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=world.time.com&#038;blog=19871253&#038;post=83489&#038;subd=timeglobalspin&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
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	<primary_category>France</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://world.time.com/category/europe/france/</primary_category_link><featured_image>http://timeglobalspin.files.wordpress.com/2013/04/int-french-members-of-parliament-13042.jpg?w=240</featured_image>
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			<media:title type="html">French Parliament legalize gay marriage</media:title>
		</media:content>

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			<media:title type="html">girondins33</media:title>
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		<title>France Legalizes Gay Marriage After Harsh Debate</title>
		<link>http://world.time.com/2013/04/23/france-legalizes-gay-marriage-after-harsh-debate/</link>
		<comments>http://world.time.com/2013/04/23/france-legalizes-gay-marriage-after-harsh-debate/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 23 Apr 2013 15:22:30 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>AP / Lori Hinnant and Sylvie Corbet</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[France]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://world.time.com/?p=83473</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[(PARIS) — France legalized gay marriage on Tuesday after a wrenching national debate and protests that flooded the streets of Paris. Legions of officers and water cannon stood ready near France&#8217;s National Assembly ahead of the final vote, bracing for possible violence on an issue that galvanized the country&#8217;s faltering conservative movement. The measure passed easily in the Socialist-majority Assembly, 331-225, just minutes after the president of the legislative body expelled a disruptive protester in pink, the color adopted by French opponents of gay marriage. &#8220;Only those who love democracy are here,&#8221; Claude Bartelone, the Assembly president, said angrily. In recent weeks, violent attacks against gay couples have spiked and some legislators have received threats — including Bartelone, who got a gunpowder-filled envelope on Monday. One of the biggest protests against same-sex marriage drew together hundreds of thousands of people bused in from the French provinces — conservative activists, schoolchildren with their parents, retirees, priests and others. That demonstration ended in blasts of tear gas, as right-wing rabble-rousers, some in masks and hoods, led the charge against police, damaging cars along the Champs-Elysees avenue and making a break for the presidential palace. (MORE: French Ministers Disclose Private Assets Amid Political Scandal) Justice Minister Christiane Taubira told lawmakers that the first weddings could be as soon as June. &#8220;We believe that the first weddings will be beautiful and that they&#8217;ll bring a breeze of joy, and that those who are opposed to them today will surely be confounded when they are overcome with the happiness of the newlyweds and the families,&#8221; she said. When President Francois Hollande promised to legalize gay marriage, it was seen as relatively uncontroversial. But the issue has become a touchstone as his popularity has sunk to unprecedented lows, largely over France&#8217;s ailing economy. But the most visible face in the fight against gay marriage — a former comedienne who goes by the name of Frigide Barjot — said the movement named &#8220;A Protest for Everyone&#8221; will continue beyond the law&#8217;s passage and possibly field candidates in 2014<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=world.time.com&#038;blog=19871253&#038;post=83473&#038;subd=timeglobalspin&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
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	<primary_category>France</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://world.time.com/category/europe/france/</primary_category_link><featured_image>http://timeglobalspin.files.wordpress.com/2013/04/france-gay-marriage_yang.jpg?w=240</featured_image>
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			<media:title type="html">Frigide Barjot</media:title>
		</media:content>

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			<media:title type="html">timeassociatedpress</media:title>
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		<title>French Family of 7 Taken Hostage in Cameroon Freed</title>
		<link>http://world.time.com/2013/04/19/cameroon-says-french-family-taken-hostage-freed/</link>
		<comments>http://world.time.com/2013/04/19/cameroon-says-french-family-taken-hostage-freed/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Fri, 19 Apr 2013 07:59:23 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>AP / DIVINE NTARYIKE and LORI HINNANT</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Cameroon]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[France]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://world.time.com/?p=82929</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[(DOUALA, Cameroon) — A French family with four young children kidnapped at gunpoint by Islamic extremists in northern Cameroon has been freed after two months in captivity, Cameroonian and French authorities said Friday. Cameroonian television showed the family stepping off an airplane, a man who had grown a thick beard carrying the smallest child. All appeared thin, but walked steadily. Neither government offered details on how or where the family was freed overnight. The French president said all seven family members were in good health on Friday in Yaounde, the Cameroon capital, and the foreign minister said they were expected to return to France on Saturday. The Feb. 19 kidnapping came as thousands of French troops were deeply involved in a military intervention against Islamic extremists in the West African country of Mali, and the French statement recalled that eight other French citizens are still being held hostage in the Sahel region of Africa. French President Francois Hollande said authorities were able to make contact with the kidnappers through intermediaries, and negotiations intensified in recent days. &#8220;We use all our contacts, but remain firm on our principles,&#8221; Hollande said. &#8220;We are not changing the principle that France does not pay ransoms.&#8221; The French gas group GDF Suez has identified the captives as an employee who worked in Yaounde and his family. The vacationing group comprised three adults and four children, whom French media reported were between 5 and 12 years old. Gerard Mastrallet, the head of GDF, said the hostages were freed, but did not offer details. &#8220;We were not involved in any negotiations but we knew that French authorities were very active,&#8221; Mastrallet said in an interview with RTL radio. Last month, a video surfaced showing a man who appeared to be Tanguy Moulin-Fournier. The man said his family was in the custody of the Islamic radical sect known as Boko Haram which wants all its members freed, especially women and children held in Nigerian and Cameroonian custody. Boko Haram has been waging a campaign of bombings and shootings<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=world.time.com&#038;blog=19871253&#038;post=82929&#038;subd=timeglobalspin&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
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	<primary_category>Cameroon</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://world.time.com/category/africa/cameroon/</primary_category_link>
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			<media:title type="html">timeassociatedpress</media:title>
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		<title>French Ministers Disclose Private Assets Amid Political Scandal</title>
		<link>http://world.time.com/2013/04/17/disclosure-of-ministers-assets-shatters-french-political-taboo/</link>
		<comments>http://world.time.com/2013/04/17/disclosure-of-ministers-assets-shatters-french-political-taboo/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Wed, 17 Apr 2013 20:26:10 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Bruce Crumley</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[corruption]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Crime]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Democracy]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Europe]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[France]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Sweden]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Swiss]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[switzerland]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[U.S.]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[conflict of interest]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[conservatives]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[financial disclosure]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[François Hollande]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[left]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[politics]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[wealth]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://world.time.com/?p=82150</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[The French have always had a difficult relationship with money — a love/hate affair that has left France’s rich and powerful as detested as they are envied by the rest of society. That tension came to the fore once more following the April 15 disclosure by French ministers of their personal wealth. That new obligation was denounced by critics as voyeuristic invasion in the private affairs of public officials, while backers praised it for shedding a little light on France’s opaque political class. The French public viewed it as both — and gobbled up details of their leaders’ holdings, even as a majority of people admitted their vote wouldn’t switch if preferred candidates turn out to be well-off. Monday’s publication of personal holdings by all 38 Cabinet members sparked as much excitement in France as it did head-scratching in countries where some form of financial disclosure by government officials is routine. The move was imposed by French President François Hollande in response to tanking public confidence in the political class after his former Budget Minister, Jérôme Cahuzac, admitted he repeatedly lied in denying he’d maintained a secret bank account in Switzerland. Public reaction to the resulting scandal sent Hollande’s approval rating down to 26%. (MORE: Swiss Account of Ex-Minister Further Darkens Hollande’s Political Fortunes) “The End of a Taboo,” trumpeted the April 16 headline of the left-leaning daily Libération. In airing conservative hostility to the measure as a cheap distraction from the Cahuzac scandal, by contrast, right-wing paper Le Figaro dismissed the wealth disclosures as “The Striptease of the Republic.” The less partisan newspaper Le Parisien opted for a more factually accurate (albeit wordier and less sensational) option, with its front-page reaction: “38 Ministers, 37 Houses, 29 Apartments, 40 Cars, 2 Boats and Three Bikes &#8230;” Indeed, the main takeaway from this parade of financial declarations — which are considered routine in Scandinavian countries and the U.S. — is if French pols are abusing their positions to fill their pockets, they’re doing a pretty cruddy job of it. Monday’s filings show<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=world.time.com&#038;blog=19871253&#038;post=82150&#038;subd=timeglobalspin&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
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		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
	<primary_category>France</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://world.time.com/category/europe/france/</primary_category_link>
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			<media:title type="html">girondins33</media:title>
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		<title>Mediapart: Meet the Upstart Journalists Shaking Up French Politics</title>
		<link>http://world.time.com/2013/04/05/mediapart-meet-the-upstart-journalists-shaking-up-french-politics/</link>
		<comments>http://world.time.com/2013/04/05/mediapart-meet-the-upstart-journalists-shaking-up-french-politics/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Fri, 05 Apr 2013 18:48:50 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Vivienne Walt / Paris</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Europe]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[France]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[cahuzac]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[edwy plenel]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Hollande]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[mauduit]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[mediapart]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://world.time.com/?p=79989</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[While President François Hollande is reeling from revelations that his former tax-enforcement minister (no less) hid fortunes of money in offshore bank accounts, the scandal has brought a sense of satisfaction in at least one corner of Paris: the offices of a small, five-year-old news site called Mediapart. Beginning last December, Mediapart’s reporters had published articles about the tall, dapper Budget Minister Jérôme Cahuzac, saying that he had evaded taxes on his considerable earnings from years as a plastic surgeon. The explosive details emerged just as Hollande was vowing to crack down on tax cheats — the portfolio assigned to Cahuzac — and fuming against actor Gérard Depardieu for leaving high-tax France. Cahuzac fiercely denied Mediapart&#8217;s allegations, including to Hollande. In a speech that has come back to haunt him, the Budget Minister also told the French Parliament he had “not now, not ever” hidden funds abroad. Shortly after, Mediapart posted an audiotape conversation from 2000, in which Cahuzac can be heard worrying that his Swiss bank account might be revealed. Last month he resigned from his ministerial job on Hollande’s orders, and on Tuesday — thanks to Mediapart — he was forced to admit that he still had about $780,000 stashed in Swiss and Singaporean accounts. (MORE: Swiss Account of Ex-Minister Further Darkens Hollande&#8217;s Political Fortunes) As bad as the scandal has been for French leaders, so it has been spectacularly good for Mediapart — for which it is just the most recent scoop. The small, feisty site has beaten the odds by breaking some of the biggest scandals of the decade in France, on a shoestring budget and against widespread skepticism from the much richer French newspapers. In its five-year existence, the site has published details of alleged campaign-finance abuse by Nicolas Sarkozy, for which the former President is now under formal investigation by police. Mediapart also broke the news of Sarkozy’s links to a Karachi arms deal; the intervention of IMF Managing Director Christine Lagarde in the legal settlement of a French businessman Bernard Tapie; and documents<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=world.time.com&#038;blog=19871253&#038;post=79989&#038;subd=timeglobalspin&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
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	<primary_category>France</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://world.time.com/category/europe/france/</primary_category_link><featured_image>http://timeglobalspin.files.wordpress.com/2013/04/int-french-president-francois-hollande.jpg?w=240</featured_image>
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			<media:title type="html">French President Francois Hollande arrives to deliver a speech at the Moroccan Parliament in Rabat</media:title>
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			<media:title type="html">viviennewalt</media:title>
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		<title>Swiss Account of Ex-Minister Further Darkens Hollande&#8217;s Political Fortunes</title>
		<link>http://world.time.com/2013/04/03/swiss-account-of-ex-minister-further-darkens-hollandes-political-fortunes/</link>
		<comments>http://world.time.com/2013/04/03/swiss-account-of-ex-minister-further-darkens-hollandes-political-fortunes/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Wed, 03 Apr 2013 20:04:23 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Bruce Crumley</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[corruption]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Europe]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[France]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Swiss]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Switzerland]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[switzerland]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[austerity]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[crime]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Elysée]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[François Hollande]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[investigation]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Marine Le Pen]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[National Front]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Nicolas Sarkozy]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[scandal]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Swiss accounts]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://world.time.com/?p=79330</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[The troubling political outlook for French President François Hollande darkened further April 2, after his former austerity-enforcing Budget Minister Jérôme Cahuzac admitted to possessing a secret Swiss bank account whose existence he previously denied. The avowal not only delivers a blow to Hollande’s campaign pledge to return transparency and accountability to government. It also undermines the President’s attempts to convince public opinion to accept deficit-reduction efforts he said were being exacted from all sections and actors of French society. Cahuzac resigned his cabinet position March 19 just hours after French prosecutors launched an official inquiry into suspicions of tax fraud. Despite that, the former amateur boxer never flinched from earlier, insistent denials of wrongdoing—and even launched slander proceedings against online Mediapart.fr publication that first broke the allegations. That position of innocence became harder to maintain after an audio recording Mediapart produced of someone fretting about the ability to keep his Swiss account secret from potential inquiry was verified by vocal testing to be that of Cahuzac. By March 26 he’d become sufficiently sure the truth would come out that Cahuzac wrote a letter to the two investigative magistrates overseeing the case to request an interview—a session of mea culpa Cahuzac revealed  on his web site Tuesday afternoon. (MORE: Amid the Depardieu Tax Debacle, France’s Budget Minister Accused of Dodging Taxes) “I met the two judges today,” Cahuzac wrote April 2. “I confirmed to them the existence of the account, and informed them that I’ve already given instructions necessary for all assets deposed in the count—which has not been added to for around 12 years—(worth) around €600,000 euros ($768,000) be repatriated to my Paris bank…Thinking I could avoid confronting a past I considered long gone was an unspeakable error. I will now face this reality in complete transparency.” He’ll have little choice. The result of his avowal to judges led to Cahuzac’s immediate placement under investigation —a step under France’s legal system akin to indictment. The crimes of tax evasion and money laundering involved carry potential prison terms in case of<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=world.time.com&#038;blog=19871253&#038;post=79330&#038;subd=timeglobalspin&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
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	<primary_category>France</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://world.time.com/category/europe/france/</primary_category_link>
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			<media:title type="html">girondins33</media:title>
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		<title>French Soccer Clubs Aren&#8217;t Safe From François Hollande&#8217;s 75% Tax on the Rich</title>
		<link>http://world.time.com/2013/04/02/french-soccer-clubs-arent-safe-from-francois-hollandes-75-tax-on-the-rich/</link>
		<comments>http://world.time.com/2013/04/02/french-soccer-clubs-arent-safe-from-francois-hollandes-75-tax-on-the-rich/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 02 Apr 2013 18:38:50 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Bruce Crumley</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Business]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Europe]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[France]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[italy]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Protests]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[soccer]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Spain]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[U.K.]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[75% income tax]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[business]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[debt crisis]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[football]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[François Hollande]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[socialists]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Sport]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[tax]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[wealth gap]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://world.time.com/?p=79240</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Even people who hate soccer (especially people who hate soccer) may want to consider how the beautiful game has become a battleground political clash over France’s financial future. Because as TIME’s Michael Schuman demonstrates in his excellent story titled &#8220;Marx’s Revenge: How Class Struggle Is Shaping the World,&#8221; surging class conflict is increasingly shaping political priorities across the world — and now even staging an unusual pitch invasion in French football. On April 2, France’s leftist government issued a denial that the country’s soccer elite will be protected from Socialist President François Hollande’s decision to hit the country’s top salaries with a 75% income tax. The previous day, the head of the French Football Federation, Noël Le Graet, played an unintentional April Fools&#8217; gag by telling the daily Le Parisien he’d gotten government assurances that France soccer stars and their clubs would be spared from a revamped 75% income tax scheme Hollande revealed March 28. Unlike the initial proposal applicable to people earning over of $1.28 million annually, Hollande’s new plan will leave large companies paying those salaries on the hook for the 75% tax. (MORE: France’s 75% Income Tax on the Rich Overturned as Unconstitutional) Yet on Monday, Le Graet claimed that pro soccer clubs — which he defined as medium-sized businesses despite their employment of sweaty multimillionaires — would be exempt from the measure. Clearly not amused, the government promptly disabused Le Graet and the public of that idea. As a result, team owners, pundits and fans alike are asking whether those new costs — coming atop heavy taxes all French businesses and employees already pay — won’t further handicap the nation’s notoriously modest pro clubs struggling to compete with their financially flush English, Spanish and Italian rivals. (The one exception at the moment in France is table-topping Paris St.-Germain, which is bankrolled by investors from Qatar.) As a lifelong soccer fan and weekend player himself, Hollande had been expected by some observers — Le Graet first among them — to provide French football an umbrella from his<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=world.time.com&#038;blog=19871253&#038;post=79240&#038;subd=timeglobalspin&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
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	<primary_category>France</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://world.time.com/category/europe/france/</primary_category_link><featured_image>http://timeglobalspin.files.wordpress.com/2013/04/518585250.jpg?w=240</featured_image>
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			<media:title type="html">FBL-EUR-C1-BARCELONA-PSG</media:title>
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			<media:title type="html">girondins33</media:title>
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		<title>Jihadi Strike in Timbuktu Reflects Altered Terrorism Threat in Mali</title>
		<link>http://world.time.com/2013/04/01/jihadi-strike-in-timbuktu-reflects-altered-terror-threat-in-mali/</link>
		<comments>http://world.time.com/2013/04/01/jihadi-strike-in-timbuktu-reflects-altered-terror-threat-in-mali/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Mon, 01 Apr 2013 16:30:23 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Bruce Crumley</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Africa]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Al-Qaeda]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Algeria]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Conflict]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Europe]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[France]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Mali]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Military]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Terrorism]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[al Qaeda in Islamic Maghreb]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Army]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[François Hollande]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[mali]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[mauritania]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Niger]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[radicals]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[security]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[terrorism]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[timbuktu]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://world.time.com/?p=79024</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[The assault launched late March 31 by jihadi fighters on the northern Mali town of Timbuktu reflects the changing security scenario in West Africa. On the one hand, the Franco-African military intervention against groups allied with al-Qaeda in Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) has inflicted considerable losses on Islamist militias — including within their leadership — and forced extremists who previously occupied the northern half of Mali to retreat to the mountainous border with Algeria to escape further fatalities from ground and air assaults. That progress allowed French President François Hollande on March 28 to outline his planned withdrawal schedule for France’s forces. But Sunday’s infiltration and attack on Timbuktu by a small unit of radicals not only demonstrates that the otherwise battered extremists are determined to continue waging jihad despite the setbacks they’ve suffered. It also suggests Islamist militias are already reverting to traditional methods of using the vast, ungovernable Sahel region to avoid enemy forces as they orchestrate regular strikes against military, government and civilian targets in Mali, Mauritania, Algeria and Niger. (MORE: French Officials Warn ‘Success’ in Mali Won’t End Islamist Threat) “The military intervention has decimated Islamist forces and killed key leaders, but no one ever believed it would eradicate jihadi groups in the Sahel,” says a senior French counterterrorism official who cannot be quoted by name. “Surviving commanders and fighters are now regrouping and gradually resuming operation, and will seek to regain some of the influence they had before they made the mistake of taking over the entire northern half of Mali. They’re reverting back from being a terrifying occupation force to being a more elusive force of terrorism.” As that happens, the official says, Islamist groups are expected to increase kidnapping, attacks on military outposts and, throughout the Sahel, suicide strikes on targets that they staged before teaming up with Tuareg militants to seize control of northern Mali in April 2012. Though that activity — which never entirely ceased during their domination of northern Mali — will remain a threat, it’s a far cry from the<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=world.time.com&#038;blog=19871253&#038;post=79024&#038;subd=timeglobalspin&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
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	<primary_category>Mali</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://world.time.com/category/africa/mali-africa/</primary_category_link><featured_image>http://timeglobalspin.files.wordpress.com/2013/04/int-mali-130401.jpg?w=240</featured_image>
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			<media:title type="html">girondins33</media:title>
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		<title>Nicolas Sarkozy&#8217;s Battle With France&#8217;s Judiciary Leads to Death Threats</title>
		<link>http://world.time.com/2013/03/28/nicolas-sarkozys-battle-with-frances-judiciary-leads-to-death-threats/</link>
		<comments>http://world.time.com/2013/03/28/nicolas-sarkozys-battle-with-frances-judiciary-leads-to-death-threats/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Thu, 28 Mar 2013 16:08:02 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Bruce Crumley</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[corruption]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Crime]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Democracy]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Europe]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[France]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Gaddafi]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Libya]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[U.K.]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[U.S.]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[campaign financing]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[controversy]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[investigation]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[L'Oréal]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Nicolas Sarkozy]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[scandal]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://world.time.com/?p=78317</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[France’s rambunctious, razor-tongued former President Nicolas Sarkozy has never hidden his disdain of the nation’s judiciary. But despite his long-running battle with French judges, even Sarkozy could never approve of what&#8217;s arisen in the wave of his latest offensive: death threats leveled at legal authorities who’ve implicated Sarkozy in a roiling illegal finance scandal. On March 27, Bordeaux Judge Jean-Michel Gentil received a letter menacing his life, those of his intimates and leaders of the left-leaning Union of Magistrates (SM). The apparent reason: Gentil heads a trio of investigating judges who on March 21 officially placed Sarkozy under investigation for “abusing the weakness” and mental frailty of L’Oréal heiress Liliane Bettencourt. That move — which under France’s inquisitorial justice system, is akin to being designated a suspect or being indicted in Anglo-American courts — was based in part on testimony from former Bettencourt employees claiming Sarkozy personally pocketed $193,000 in 2007 from Bettencourt as an illicit donation for his victorious presidential run. The death threat addressed to Gentil less than a week later promised revenge against the “group of red revolutionary judges; totalitarian, rabid and politically committed” involved in the case, and warned the magistrate and SM officials that “one of your people is going to disappear.” (MORE: French Police Raid Sarkozy’s Home, Offices in Illicit-Campaign-Funding Inquiry) Condemnation of the threat — which also carried in its envelope a blank bullet — was unified across the political sphere, but still left Sarkozy and his supporters in a particularly uncomfortable position. The reason: the already outraged reaction by fellow conservatives to Sarkozy’s official implication in the epic Bettencourt scandal. Sarkozy defenders not only mocked his designation as a de facto suspect in the case as ridiculous and politically motivated, but at times even singled out Gentil personally. “I object to the way [Gentil] does his work,” said Sarkozy’s former Élysée adviser Henri Guaino on Europe 1 radio on March 22. “I find it disgraceful. I believe [Gentil] has dishonored a man, state institutions [and] the justice system &#8230; It would be laughable<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=world.time.com&#038;blog=19871253&#038;post=78317&#038;subd=timeglobalspin&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
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	<primary_category>France</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://world.time.com/category/europe/france/</primary_category_link><featured_image>http://timeglobalspin.files.wordpress.com/2013/03/sarkozy_legal_woes_0328.jpg?w=240</featured_image>
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			<media:title type="html">Nicolas Sarkozy</media:title>
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			<media:title type="html">girondins33</media:title>
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		<title>France May Aid Syrian Rebels Unilaterally If EU Doesn&#8217;t Lift Arms Embargo</title>
		<link>http://world.time.com/2013/03/14/france-may-aid-syrian-rebels-unilaterally-if-eu-doesnt-lift-arms-embargo/</link>
		<comments>http://world.time.com/2013/03/14/france-may-aid-syrian-rebels-unilaterally-if-eu-doesnt-lift-arms-embargo/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Thu, 14 Mar 2013 17:32:08 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Bruce Crumley</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[arab uprisings]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Conflict]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[E.U.]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Europe]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[France]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Gaddafi]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Germany]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[iran]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Islam]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Libya]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Qatar]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[religion]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Saudi Arabia]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Syria]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Terrorism]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Turkey]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[U.K.]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[arms]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Bashar al-Assad]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Britain]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[civil war]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Damascus]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Embargo]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[European Union]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[François Hollande]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[London]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Military]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[paris]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[terrorism]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[UK]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://world.time.com/?p=75356</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[France has significantly upped its efforts to unblock Western military support for rebels fighting Syrian President Bashar al-Assad by calling for the European Union to lift its arms embargo in the conflict. In the most emphatic sign yet that Paris intends to get weapons and ammunition flowing to anti-Assad fighters, French Foreign Affairs Minister Laurent Fabius said March 14 that if the E.U. and other international partners fail to heed that call, France may act on its own to bolster rebel fighting capacity. “The position we’ve taken, with [President] François Hollande, is to demand a lifting the arms embargo… [as] one of the only ways to get the situation moving politically,” Fabius told France Info radio Thursday morning. Asked what France would do if its partners refused that request, Fabius indicated Paris would act unilaterally, reminding listeners that “France is a sovereign nation”. (MORE: Syria’s Many Militias: Inside the Chaos of the Anti-Assad Rebellion) That push isn’t the first time France has sought to extend aid to Syrian civilians and anti-Assad militias beyond the medical and humanitarian assistance it now provides. During a Jan. 28 conference on Syria in Paris, Fabius warned that continuing to withhold armaments to democratic forces within the Syrian resistance risked seeing large and powerful Islamist members of the anti-government coalition seize control of the country once the conflict ended. Fabius more recently escalated the tone of that message in a March 13 editorial in the daily Libération by describing what he called a Franco-British initiative. That consisted, Fabius said of seeking to bring a swifter end to the escalating massacre of the civil war by offering military as well as political and moral support to rebel forces. &#8220;More than 70,000 dead and a million refugees, the systematic destruction of a country: the second anniversary of the launch of the Syrian revolution is an anniversary of blood and tears,” Fabius wrote Wednesday. “We must convince our partners, particularly in Europe, that we no longer have any other choice than to lift the embargo on arms to<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=world.time.com&#038;blog=19871253&#038;post=75356&#038;subd=timeglobalspin&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
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	<primary_category>Syria</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://world.time.com/category/middle-east/syria/</primary_category_link>
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			<media:title type="html">girondins33</media:title>
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		<title>The Terror of Toulouse: How Much Did the French Know About a Spree Shooter?</title>
		<link>http://world.time.com/2013/03/11/the-terror-of-toulouse-how-much-did-the-french-know-about-a-spree-shooter/</link>
		<comments>http://world.time.com/2013/03/11/the-terror-of-toulouse-how-much-did-the-french-know-about-a-spree-shooter/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Mon, 11 Mar 2013 16:42:15 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Bruce Crumley</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Af-Pak]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Afghanistan]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Al-Qaeda]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Crime]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Europe]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[France]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Islam]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Pakistan]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Terrorism]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[extremism]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[intelligence]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[jihad]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Mohamed Merah]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Nicolas Sarkozy]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[radicals]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Salafism]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[security]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Taliban]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[terrorism]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://world.time.com/?p=74246</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[On March 11, a one-year memorial was held for French parachutist Imad Ibn Ziaten, the first death in an eight-day-long shooting spree in Toulouse and nearby Montauban that ended with a total of seven victims killed — including three children at a Jewish day school. The shooter, Mohammed Merah, had targeted Ibn Ziaten to punish France for its participation in battling the Taliban in Afghanistan. But 12 months after the series of attacks — which concluded with Merah&#8217;s own death after a 32-hour siege — the country is still learning details about the self-proclaimed al-Qaeda member’s transformation from petty hood to violent jihadist. Perhaps most disturbing among those revelations are indications that the nation’s domestic intelligence agency identified Merah as a potential security risk as early as 2007, yet failed to prevent the mass killings of March 2012. The latest evidence arose March 10, when the regional French channel France 3 Midi-Pyrénées revealed documents showing security forces had begun taking notice of Merah’s ties to extremists in Toulouse as early as October 2006. Though that initial file focused mainly on the higher-profile militants that Merah was in contact with, it did contain a photo of the smiling 18-year-old holding a Koran in one hand and a large knife in the other. By May 2007, the France 3 report noted, a second brief devoted primarily to Merah described the youth as a “radical jihadi” who “recently joined this [Salafi] movement” police had infiltrated. (MORE: France’s Benghazi: Was the Case of Mohammed Merah Bungled?) That online report came ahead of France 3’s March 11 broadcast of a documentary casting additional doubt on the official theory that Merah had been a lone wolf who’d prepared and carried out his three gun attacks alone — making detection by security forces nearly impossible. That version has been fiercely defended by authorities in former President Nicolas Sarkozy’s conservative government, who deny that lax oversight was in any way responsible for Merah’s deadly spree. That position has been challenged by families of victims, investigative journalists, and even<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=world.time.com&#038;blog=19871253&#038;post=74246&#038;subd=timeglobalspin&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
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	<primary_category>Terrorism</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://world.time.com/category/terrorism/</primary_category_link><featured_image>http://timeglobalspin.files.wordpress.com/2013/03/int-toulouse-shooting-anniversary-1303.jpg?w=240</featured_image>
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			<media:title type="html">A soldier holds a portrait of late French paratrooper Imad Ibn Ziaten, the first victim of Islamist gunman Mohamed Merah, on March 11, 2013 in Toulouse, during a ceremony awarding him with the Legion d&#039;Honneur.</media:title>
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			<media:title type="html">girondins33</media:title>
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		<title>French Officials Warn &#8216;Success&#8217; in Mali Won&#8217;t End Islamist Threat</title>
		<link>http://world.time.com/2013/03/05/french-officials-warn-success-in-mali-wont-end-islamist-threat/</link>
		<comments>http://world.time.com/2013/03/05/french-officials-warn-success-in-mali-wont-end-islamist-threat/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 05 Mar 2013 18:36:11 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Bruce Crumley</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Africa]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Al-Qaeda]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Algeria]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Borders]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Democracy]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[development]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Europe]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[France]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Islam]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Mali]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Military]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Terrorism]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[africa]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Chad]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[jihad]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[mali]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[paris]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[terrorism]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://world.time.com/?p=72963</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[As the French-led offensive against Islamist militants in Mali advances, diplomats and intelligence officials in Paris are beginning to tamp down expectations that eliminating al-Qaeda-linked extremism in the region can be achieved anytime soon. Despite the military operation continuing to inflict heavy losses on jihadi combatants hunkered down in northern Mali’s mountainous border area, they say, the amorphous terrorist threat those extremists pose makes full military victory a relative notion. “Final success in this case probably comes in us decimating Islamists in Mali, and send them scattering to open, unsecured parts of the Sahel — where their ability to organize and execute terror is greatly diminished,” says a French intelligence official who agreed to speak to TIME on the condition of anonymity. “This intervention has cost the Islamists very dearly, and they’re now dug in and trying to survive. But it’s also evident they have no intention of being taken alive, and will die fighting to avoid that if necessary. This unfortunately isn’t an enemy you can eliminate in a single operation.” That caution tempers France&#8217;s recent victories in northern Mali. On March 5, French officials revealed that operations by some 1,600 French and Chadian special forces the previous night had killed around 15 extremists. That followed news on March 3 that some 50 radicals had been slain in heavy fighting that also claimed the life of the third French soldier since the intervention began Jan. 11. Earlier battles left scores of jihadi fighters dead — including a series of skirmishes in late February that Chadian officials say killed at least 93 extremists. Those numbers are considerable given estimates by some French military commanders that between 1,200 and 1,500 Islamist fighters are active in Mali — a figure the French intelligence officer calls “closer probably to 800 or 900.” Two commanders of al-Qaeda-allied Islamist militias in the Sahel are rumored to have died in recent battles. Authorities in Chad say their troops gunned down  al-Qaeda in Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) regional leader Abdelhamid Abou Zeid — a brutal terrorist and kidnapper whose group is holding many of the 37 Western hostages currently detained<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=world.time.com&#038;blog=19871253&#038;post=72963&#038;subd=timeglobalspin&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
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	<primary_category>Terrorism</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://world.time.com/category/terrorism/</primary_category_link><featured_image>http://timeglobalspin.files.wordpress.com/2013/03/00_mali1.jpg?w=240</featured_image>
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			<media:title type="html">French in Mali</media:title>
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			<media:title type="html">girondins33</media:title>
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		<title>Stop the Presses: (Another) Strauss-Kahn Sex Book Challenged in Court</title>
		<link>http://world.time.com/2013/02/28/stop-the-presses-another-strauss-kahn-sex-book-challenged-in-court/</link>
		<comments>http://world.time.com/2013/02/28/stop-the-presses-another-strauss-kahn-sex-book-challenged-in-court/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Thu, 28 Feb 2013 07:25:23 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Bruce Crumley</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Europe]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[France]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Gender]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Sexual Violence]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Women]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[books]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Dominique Strauss-Kahn]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[DSK]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[law]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[paris]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[publishing]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[scandal]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[sex]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://world.time.com/?p=71701</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[People wishing the world would turn the page on the seemingly endless Dominique Strauss-Kahn sex saga have  again seen their hopes dashed. On Feb. 26 a Paris court ordered author Marcela Iacub and her publisher Stock to pay Strauss-Kahn €50,000 ($65,000) in damages for another book that—wait for it—details the former International Monetary Fund chief’s allegedly boundless libido and peculiar sexual proclivities. The text grew from an affair Iacub and DSK allegedly pursued between January and August, 2012—a period well after Strauss-Kahn’s peccadilloes had come to the attention of most of the planet. In dishing dirt about her ex-lover, Iacub turns against a disgraced figure she repeatedly defended in newspaper editorials and essays—some of which were written during the pair’s fling. (MORE: The Endless Pathos and Hubris of L’Affaire DSK) Due out Feb. 27, the book titled Belle et Bête (which can be translated as “Beauty and Beast” or “Beauty and Stupid”) describes the conquests and penchants of a “half man, half pig.” It also recounts conversations Iacub says he had with Strauss-Kahn’s unsuspecting wife, Anne Sinclair, about the revelations that had laid her husband low. Last week Sinclair responded in anger to French newsweekly Nouvel Observateur’s decision to publish excerpts of the book, asking why it gave “credit to the maneuvers of a perverse and dishonest woman driven by her fascination for the sensational and the lure of money?” Strauss-Kahn sounded a similar note during Tuesday’s court proceedings, when he asked the court whether “anything [is] permitted in order to make money?” “I want to tell you how shocked I am by this scornful and totally lying text,” said Strauss-Kahn, 63, a former French presidential hopeful. “What’s written cares nothing of (its) devastation to my private life.” The court sympathized with DSK’s objections. In addition to ordering Iacub and Stock to pay Strauss-Kahn damages, the ruling instructed the Nouvel Observateur to hand over an additional  €25,000 ($32,500) to the former IMF honcho. Judges also instructed the book’s publisher to insert a warning into each copy so potential buyers will know the work “Violates Personal Privacy.”  That ought to work wonders dissuading voyeuristic<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=world.time.com&#038;blog=19871253&#038;post=71701&#038;subd=timeglobalspin&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
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	<primary_category>France</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://world.time.com/category/europe/france/</primary_category_link><featured_image>http://timeglobalspin.files.wordpress.com/2013/02/int-dominique-strauss-kahn-130227.jpg?w=240</featured_image>
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			<media:title type="html">Dominique Strauss-Kahn attempts to ban book written by Marcela Iacub.</media:title>
		</media:content>

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			<media:title type="html">girondins33</media:title>
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		<title>The War in Mali: Does France Have an Exit Strategy?</title>
		<link>http://world.time.com/2013/02/26/the-war-in-mali-does-france-have-an-exit-strategy/</link>
		<comments>http://world.time.com/2013/02/26/the-war-in-mali-does-france-have-an-exit-strategy/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 26 Feb 2013 17:17:35 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Bruce Crumley</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Africa]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Al-Qaeda]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Borders]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Cameroon]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Conflict]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[France]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Mali]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Military]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Nigeria]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Terrorism]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[U.N.]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[extremism]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[hostages]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Islamists]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[jihad]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[kidnapping]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[mali]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[peacekeeping]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[United Nations]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://world.time.com/?p=71377</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[It’s looking increasingly unlikely that France’s military intervention in Mali will be over anytime soon. Despite comments by French officials earlier this month that Paris hopes to begin withdrawing troops in March, it now seems evident the stiffening resistance of jihadi groups in the Sahel — pushed out of northern Mali&#8217;s cities by the French-led expedition last month — will require a lingering French presence for months, perhaps even years. (MORE: Mali’s War: After Surging into Islamist-Held North, Will France Retreat?) Over the past two weeks, French commandos have engaged in deadly combat with jihadi fighters, some linked to al-Qaeda, in the mountainous region in northern Mali. That included a Feb. 19 battle that killed 20 insurgents and also claimed France’s second fatality in the campaign. In the meantime, extremists have mounted suicide bombings, mine attacks and armed assaults in and around recently liberated Malian towns as proof that their capacity for violence and terrorism is anything but vanquished. Losses have been even heavier among forces from regional African nations that have deployed soldiers to reinforce — and eventually fully replace — France’s contingent in Mali. Authorities in Chad say they lost 23 soldiers — and killed 93 Islamists — in recent combat with retrenched Islamist units. The wider threat from regional extremists has been demonstrated in other ways. On Feb. 25, a video posted on YouTube by radicals claiming to represent the Nigerian group Boko Haram took responsibility for the Feb. 16 kidnapping of a French family of seven in northern Cameroon. That brought the total of French nationals held by Islamist groups in Africa to 15, with captors demanding the release of their jailed comrades as well as millions in ransom payments. French authorities refuse to negotiate with abductors and say their activity won’t undermine French resolve to battle the jihadi threat in Africa and beyond. Yet French authorities aren’t abandoning plans to begin withdrawal of France’s 4,000 troops from Mali next month. During background briefings on Feb. 25, officials in Paris said they still hoped conditions would be<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=world.time.com&#038;blog=19871253&#038;post=71377&#038;subd=timeglobalspin&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
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	<primary_category>Africa</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://world.time.com/category/africa/</primary_category_link><featured_image>http://timeglobalspin.files.wordpress.com/2013/02/517514594-copy.jpg?w=240</featured_image>
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			<media:title type="html">French in Mali</media:title>
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		<title>CEO of U.S. Tire Company Gets into Fight with All of France</title>
		<link>http://world.time.com/2013/02/21/ceo-of-u-s-tire-company-gets-into-fight-with-all-of-france/</link>
		<comments>http://world.time.com/2013/02/21/ceo-of-u-s-tire-company-gets-into-fight-with-all-of-france/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Thu, 21 Feb 2013 18:55:22 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Bruce Crumley</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Business]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[E.U.]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Europe]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Foreign Investment]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[France]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Germany]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[U.K.]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[U.S.]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[business]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Economy]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[European Union]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Goodyear]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[investment]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[maurice taylor]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[MIchelin]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[productivity]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[titan]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[work ethic]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://world.time.com/?p=70411</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[What’s French for “cat fight”? Ask American businessman and would-be industrial investor Maurice Taylor, who has provoked la France entière by claiming the “French workforce gets paid high wages but works only three hours.” In doing so, Taylor mockingly dismissed French government invitations to invest in a struggling tire factory in northern France. “How stupid do you think we are?” Taylor asked in a letter sent to French Industrial Renewal Minister Arnaud Montebourg, who had asked the CEO of the Titan International tire company to invest in a money-losing Goodyear plant in Amiens. The notoriously hard-edged Taylor maintained the factory suffers from the same lame work ethic, coddled labor force, union domination and protection of feckless politicians he seems to see plaguing the wider French economy. “You can keep the so-called workers. Titan has no interest in the Amiens North factory,” Taylor said in a double-barrel missive revealed by the French media Feb. 20. “Titan is going to buy a Chinese tire company or an Indian one, pay less than one euro per hour and ship all the tires France needs.” (MORE: Goodyear’s French Nightmare) That’s exactly the kind of business ethos assured to enervate Montebourg—a crusading leftist cabinet member who has repeatedly locked horns with bosses over job cuts. Last year Montebourg threatened to nationalize French units of Arcelor Mittal over what he called the steel giant’s “lying” by ignoring promises not to close plants. In replying to Taylor&#8217;s broadside, Montebourg scorned  the CEO&#8217;s “extremist insults” of France as a reflection his “perfect ignorance of what our country is.” Perhaps, but Taylor’s tarring of the Amiens operation succeeded to obtain what may have been a broader objective: using it as a broad brush to tarnish a purportedly pampered, work-averse French society—one the 1996 GOP primary candidate doesn’t seem too fond of. Indeed, in deriding the Goodyear workforce that “gets paid high wages but&#8230;get(s) one hour for breaks and lunch, talk for three and work for three,” Taylor seemed to be shaking a fist at the entire French socioeconomic model<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=world.time.com&#038;blog=19871253&#038;post=70411&#038;subd=timeglobalspin&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
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	<primary_category>France</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://world.time.com/category/europe/france/</primary_category_link><featured_image>http://timeglobalspin.files.wordpress.com/2013/02/goodyear_0221.jpg?w=240</featured_image>
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