Kim Willsher

Dramatic life of the Little Sparrow, nation’s most famous singer, is remembered at the national library in Paris in year she would have turned 100

Sigolène Vinson survived the attack on the magazine and has given a chilling account of how one of the terrorist gunmen spared her life.

The French president is keeping mum on a matter he says concerns personal freedoms, refusing to answer questions about his personal life.

As thunderstorms raged in the area last week, the symbolism was potent: the picket-line bonfire hissed and went out.

If Francois Hollande becomes president of France, it will be a job he has worked for and hankered after for most of his adult life.

French social media users have been warned not to "bugger" the country's election by talking about exit poll results before voting is officially over.

Damaging new claims have emerged about the funding of Nicolas Sarkozy's 2007 election campaign and his links with slain Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi.

Capital trials new electric car-sharing scheme -- and hopes to have 5 000 vehicles on the roads by 2013.

An earthquake, hurricanes, cholera, political crises -- it seemed Haiti's woes could not get worse.

Austerity in Europe is in stark contrast to the experience of footballers in South Africa, say politicians.

Want to save the planet? Wear your jeans two days a week, wash them every fifth day, and let them dry by themselves. Or better still, don't wash them at all. And don't even think of ironing them. This is the conclusion of a report commissioned by France's environment agency on the ecological impact of a pair of denims.

History contends that the ashes of Saint Joan of Arc were gathered up from the pyre on which she was burned alive and tossed into the River Seine. Anxious to avoid creating a martyr, the English, who had ordered her death in 1431, wanted nothing left of the 19-year-old French heroine. According to legend, a devoted follower managed to find and conceal some of her remains.