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ONE in four cafes, snack bars and seafront restaurants in tourist hotspots across France are breaking hygiene rules or serving food unfit for consumption, the agriculture ministry said today. French health inspectors visiting 9,400 food establishments found more than 2,600 to be in breach of at least one hygiene rule, Agriculture and Fisheries Minister Michel Barnier told Le Parisien daily. Warnings were issued for dirty toilets and kitchens and for poor hygiene among staff. As well, inspection teams carted away 30 tonnes of food unfit to serve from 550 food shacks and restaurants. Thirty-seven establishments were shut down altogether, for...

I think Tiger may be the fastest cat on earth, at least of the domestic variety. The unhappily confined feline has made two jail-breaks in the past three days. Neither outing lasted more than 20 minutes (still, clearly enough time to go applaud in Mr. Lee’s frowel bed), but both yielded rather astonishing treasures. At least Tiger saw them as valuable, and he is the Go-To guy for yardpolice duty. Left eviscerated on the back deck on Sunday afternoon was a bullfrog. The slain amphibian must have had dementia and gone missing from home, because we live nowhere near water....

French marines shoot children in bungled hostage display By Our Foreign Staff Last Updated: 11:39PM BST 29/06/2008 Seventeen people have been injured, including a child left in a critical condition, after French soldiers fired live bullets instead of blanks during an open day display. Troops stand outside the barracks near Carcassone Fifteen civilians and two soldiers were injured in the incident which involved a demonstration by members of a marines parachute regiment of hostage liberation exercises. Four of the 17 were seriously injured, with two described as critical, following "incomprehensible" scenes at the barracks near Carcassone, in the country's south-west....

Brigitte Bardot fined for racism From correspondents in Paris June 03, 2008 11:19pm Article from: Agence France-Presse FRANCE'S 1960s screen icon Brigitte Bardot has received a 15,000 euros ($24,440) fine today for inciting hatred against Muslims. In December 2006, the film star-turned-animal rights activist wrote a letter to France's then interior minister, current President Nicolas Sarkozy, arguing that Muslims should stun animals before slaughtering them during the Aid al-Kabir holiday. She outraged anti-racist groups by saying: "I've had enough of being led by the nose by this whole population which is destroying us, (and) destroying our country by imposing their...

PARIS (Reuters) - French former film star Brigitte Bardot went on trial on Tuesday for insulting Muslims, the fifth time she has faced the charge of "inciting racial hatred" over her controversial remarks about Islam and its followers. Prosecutors asked that the Paris court hand the 73-year-old former sex symbol a two-month suspended prison sentence and fine her 15,000 euros ($23,760) for saying the Muslim community was "destroying our country and imposing its acts." Since retiring from the film industry in the 1970s, Bardot has become a prominent animal rights activist but she has also courted controversy by denouncing Muslim...

PARIS: Bernard Kouchner, the foreign minister of France and a longtime humanitarian, diplomatic and political activist on the international scene, says that whoever succeeds President George W. Bush may restore something of the United States' battered image and standing overseas, but that "the magic is over." In a wide-ranging conversation with Roger Cohen of the International Herald Tribune at the launch of a Forum for New Diplomacy in Paris, Kouchner on Tuesday also held out the hope of talking with Hamas, the Palestinian faction that rules the Gaza Strip but has been ostracized by the West and by its Palestinian...

PARIS - Partial results showed President Nicolas Sarkozy's backers losing in Paris and other key French cities Sunday in the first round of municipal elections seen as a referendum on the increasingly unpopular conservative. Official results of the total vote nationwide showed candidates from Sarkozy's UMP party and its allies with 45.5 percent and the Socialists and their allies with 47 percent. The total was not broken down by city, but projections based on partial results by the polling agencies Ipsos and TNS-Sofres showed Socialists on track to take over key cities previously held by the right, including Strasbourg, Reims,...

WELLINGTON, New Zealand - A rare and threatened species of tiny frog has been found breeding in a New Zealand animal park, meaning its future may now be more secure, researchers said Monday. The 13 finger nail-sized Maud Island froglets were discovered clinging to the backs of full-grown male frogs at the Karori Wildlife Sanctuary in the capital Wellington, said researcher Kerri Lukis. The frogs are normally found only on two islands in the Malborough Sounds region of New Zealand's South Island. "Maud Island frogs have never been found breeding" before, even on their home island, said Lukis, a masters...

Giraffes And Frogs Provide More Evidence Of New Species Hidden In Plain SightGenetic subdivision in the giraffe based on microsatellites alleles. (Credit: David M Brown et al., Courtesy BMC Biology) ScienceDaily (Jan. 2, 2008) — Two new articles provide further evidence that we have hugely underestimated the number of species with which we share our planet. Today sophisticated genetic techniques mean that superficially identical animals previously classed as members of a single species, including the frogs and giraffes in these studies, could in fact come from several distinct 'cryptic' species. In the Upper Amazon, Kathryn Elmer and Stephen Lougheed working...

Science Daily — PHILADELPHIA -- The "French paradox" -- the perplexing disconnect between France's rich cuisine and slender population -- can be explained in part by portions that are significantly smaller in French restaurants and supermarkets than in their American counterparts. So say researchers at the University of Pennsylvania and CNRS in Paris, who compared the size of restaurant meals, single-serve foods and cookbook portions on both sides of the Atlantic. "The French paradox is only a paradox if one assumes that dietary fat is the major cause of obesity and cardiovascular disease," said Paul Rozin, professor of psychology at...

On a recent sunny weekend in the usually sleepy town of Craponne-sur-Arzon, American flags festooned the streets, country music blared amid the sidewalk cafés, and hundreds of people milled about in cowboy hats or even top-to-toe Wild West get-ups. Dozens of folks turned local squares in this town in the Haute-Loire region of southern France into impromptu, western-style dance floors. The catalyst for all this was the annual Country Rendez-Vous, a three-day festival of country-western music and bluegrass that takes place here each summer in late July. Over the past two decades, country and western festivals have sprung up in...

PARIS (Reuters) - A senior French politician, now a minister in President Nicolas Sarkozy's government, suggested last year that U.S. President George W. Bush might have been behind the September 11, 2001 attacks, according to a website. The www.ReOpen911.info website, which promotes September 11 conspiracy theories, has posted a video clip of French Housing Minister Christine Boutin appearing to question that Osama bin Laden's al Qaeda group orchestrated the attacks. Boutin's office sought to play down the remarks. Asked in an interview last November, before she became minister, whether she thought Bush might be behind the attacks, Boutin says: "I...

Percentage of frogs in food jumps BY DAVE BARRY (This classic Dave Barry column was originally published Dec. 17, 1995.) It's getting worse. When I say ''it,'' I am referring to the worldwide epidemic of frogs showing up in food, which I documented recently, describing two worldwide incidents, one involving a frog baked onto a pretzel, and the other involving a frog in a frozen Chicken Cantonese dinner. When I say ''is getting worse,'' I'm referring to a shocking new development that occurred recently in Orange, Calif., according to a superb story in the Orange County Register, written by Lori...

French Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin on Friday urged the United States and other foreign nations to withdraw from Iraq in 2008 and said the war had "shattered" America's image abroad. The Iraqi conflict, which has killed tens of thousands of Iraqis and some 3,200 U.S. troops in the past four years, is sapping the power of the United States to peacefully influence other players in the troubled Middle East, he said. "The war with Iraq marked a turning point. It shattered America's image," said Villepin, who opposed the 2003 invasion of Iraq, at Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts. "It...

One reason up to a third of the world's frog species are in danger of extinction may be estrogen-like pollutants in the environment that turn male tadpoles into females, according to a new study.

Violence in Iraq will continue to worsen until all foreign troops are pulled out, Dominique de Villepin has warned, dismissing as "absurd" the idea that an enlarged US force could bring stability and peace to the country. In an interview with the Financial Times, France's prime minister indirectly criticised the decision by US President George W. Bush to boost his country's military presence in Iraq. Mr de Villepin, who has just three months left in office, said an occupying force was itself the "founding stone of the crisis" and a clear timetable had to be set for its withdrawal. "The...

THE Eiffel Tower's lights will be turned off for five minutes on Friday as part of a campaign to save energy and draw attention to the plight of the planet. The agency that manages the Paris landmark said today that it will be joining a campaign to draw attention to "sustainable development and the preservation of the planet" with the five-minute blackout at 5.55am AEDT. The campaign called Five Minutes of Respite for the Planet is being held as world experts meet in Paris to thrash out a report on global warming. The Eiffel Tower has recently changed its lighting...

FRENCH President Jacques Chirac, one of the fiercest opponents of the US-led war in Iraq, warned today that the conflict had provided a dangerous new breeding ground for terrorism. "As France had foreseen and feared, the war in Iraq has sparked upheavals that have yet to show their full effects," Mr Chirac said in a traditional New Year's address to the French diplomatic corps. "It offered terrorism a new field for expansion," he said, in a broadside against a conflict Washington still describes as part of the "war on terror" launched in 2001 following the September 11 attacks. He said...

Hundreds of people emerged from tents beside this city’s Canal St.-Martin to greet the chilly New Year with a hot lunch from a nearby soup kitchen. But not all of them were homeless. Dozens of otherwise well-housed, middle-class French have been spending nights in tents along the canal, in the 10th Arrondissement, in solidarity with the country’s growing number of “sans domicile fixe,” or “without fixed address,” the French euphemism for people living on the street. The bleak yet determinedly cheerful sleep-in is meant to embarrass the French government into doing something about the problem. “Each person should have the...

PARIS (Reuters) - France has decided to pull its special forces out of Afghanistan after a NATO-led stabilisation force extended operations to the whole country, the French defense ministry said on Sunday. The contingent of 200 elite troops, operating under U.S. command near the Pakistan border, will be withdrawn at the beginning of 2007, a spokesman said. The announcement coincides with a visit to Afghanistan by Defense Minister Michele Alliot-Marie, who told French radio it was part of a wider reorganization of foreign troops. France is part of a 32,000-strong NATO-led International Security Assistance Force in Afghanistan, which took over...

France to pull elite troops from Afghanistan Last Updated: Sunday, December 17, 2006 | 1:54 PM ET CBC News France will withdraw its 200 special forces troops from Afghanistan within weeks, authorities announced Sunday. The elite soldiers have been serving under U.S. forces in the southeast, battling Taliban and al-Qaeda militants. The rest of France's contribution in Afghanistan — about 1,100 troops — have been under NATO leadership and stationed in the relatively safe capital, Kabul. French authorities have resisted repeated calls from NATO leaders and individual countries in the coalition, including Canada, for the troops to be deployed in...

In an effort to put a stop to Israeli overflights in Lebanon, the French Armed Forces has deployed an Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) squadron in southern Lebanon to conduct intelligence-gathering missions in place of the IDF. France, a member of UNIFIL, has expressed adamant opposition to IAF overflights in Lebanon. Last month, OC Planning Division Maj.-Gen. Ido Nehushtan traveled to Paris for meetings with senior military officials during which he tried to explain Israel's operational needs. The flights, the IDF claims, are necessary for gathering intelligence and keeping an eye on the Lebanese-Syrian border through which weapons are smuggled to...

MORE than eight million litres of this season's production of Beaujolais wine is being turned into near-pure alcohol for use in disinfectants, cleaning products or fuel additives, as French vineyards face up to a massive overproduction crisis.A chronic wine glut, falling domestic consumption and fierce overseas competition have converged to create a wine crisis on an unprecedented scale. With "lakes" of unsold wine threatening to undermine prices, the European Union has resorted to paying vintners to destroy some of their stock each year, distilling billions of bottles of perfectly drinkable wine into pure alcohol. Sceptics say the measure, which cost...

Translation: "TIME TO COME TOGETHER" says Segolene Royal,named candidate of the Socialist Party

Relatives and friends of two French teenagers who were electrocuted as they fled from police a year ago have gathered in Clichy-sous-Bois near Paris. A plaque was unveiled in front of their school, and a wreath-laying ceremony was held at the power sub-station where the teenagers tried to hide. The deaths of Zyed Benna and Bouna Traore sparked three weeks of violent riots in France's poor suburbs as the young and unemployed vented their anger over what they saw as lack of opportunity and racial discrimination. The crowd gathered in silent prayer wearing t-shirts with the slogan "Dead for nothing"....

THE French government is to hold an emergency meeting on boosting transport security, after an arson attack on a bus left a woman on the verge of death, the prime minister's office said today. The attack by youths in the southern city of Marseille was the worst incident in an upsurge of urban violence during the weekend, on the anniversary of the riots that shook France last year. Bus drivers in the city refused to return to work today until security was reinforced, prompting Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy to double the number of riot police in Marseille to more than...

UNITED NATIONS - Israeli overflights of Lebanese air space are "extremely dangerous" because French-led U.N. peacekeepers on the ground could see them as hostile acts and fire in self-defense, France's defense minister said Friday. ADVERTISEMENT French Defense Minister Michele Alliot-Marie told a news conference the violations of Lebanese air space could give others an excuse not to obey a cease-fire imposed by the U.N. Security Council to end this summer's war between Israel and Hezbollah. "I remind that the violations of the air space are extremely dangerous," Alliot-Marie said. "They are dangerous first because they may be felt as hostile...

PARIS, Oct. 8 — It took more than 10 minutes to persuade the Paris police station’s highest-ranking officer that a crime might have taken place, but that did not deter Jérôme Martinez and his two companions. After all, the three had marched halfway across the Latin Quarter one evening in late September, accompanied by about 40 fellow advocates, waving banners and handing out parking-ticket-style leaflets that claimed they had committed a number of offenses. Among their crimes was listening to a song purchased from iTunes on a device not made by Apple Computer. The group, StopDRM, largely made up of...

Ask people outside the French immigrant community why the Jews are leaving their country, and the usual answer is that they are making aliya to escape the rising tide of anti-Semitism. Ask the French olim themselves, however, and the responses become more diverse and complex. Many recent arrivals say in no uncertain terms that it was primarily anti-Semitism that brought them from France to Israel. Others acknowledge that while anti-Semitism has increased in recent years, the phenomenon has been due largely to the intifada and emanates mainly from young Muslim immigrant men, mostly from North Africa and poorly integrated into...

BEIRUT, Sept 12, 2006 (AFP) - More than a dozen French Leclerc battle tanks and a dozen armored vehicles arrived in Lebanon on Tuesday as France builds up its forces, as part of the UN Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL). The 13 tanks and other armored vehicles arrived in Beirut's port aboard the cargo ship Fast Arrow, where they were expected to be unloaded later in the day and join French forces stationed nearby, an AFP reporter at the port said. A second French naval ship with additional vehicles and spare parts was expected to arrive Wednesday, a French military...

PARIS -- "We are all Americans," France's Le Monde newspaper proclaimed on Sept. 12, 2001, speaking for millions worldwide in the aftermath of the terrorist attacks on the United States. Five years later, the respected daily carried a very different message Monday: Its lead editorial was titled "Bush's Mistakes." The paper's assessment five years ago reflected a collective shock and sympathy felt in France and many nations that has given way to a much more complex view of the United States since then, particularly after the war in Iraq. In its issue Monday, Le Monde called the war in Afghanistan...

A majority of Canadians believe U.S. foreign policy was one of the root causes that led to the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks, and Quebecers are quicker to criticize the U.S. administration for its international actions than other Canadians, a recent poll suggests. Those conclusions are found in a newly released poll conducted by Léger Marketing for the Association for Canadian Studies. The poll suggests that 77 per cent of Quebecers polled primarily blame American foreign policy for the Sept. 11 attacks. The results suggest 57 per cent in Ontario hold a similar view. Canadian opinions have hardened against the United...

Officials in Jerusalem expressed disappointment at what they view as French backtracking on an earlier commitment to send thousands of soldiers to take part in the UN peacekeeping force in Lebanon, Israel Radio reported on Saturday. Foreign Ministry sources said Jerusalem expects France to "come to its senses and abide by its word," adding that the UN force should be a robust one which would be authorized to act in order to enforce the terms of the cease-fire.

UN force put in doubt as French reveal militia fear From Charles Bremner in Paris PLANS for a 15,000-strong United Nations force in Lebanon were cast into doubt yesterday when France demanded guarantees that Hezbollah forces would first be disarmed and Germany said it would not send combat troops. President Chirac’s office announced that France would add immediately 200 troops to its contingent of 200 serving with the existing UN force in south Lebanon (Unifil), which France commands. The statement, after a telephone conversation between M Chirac and Kofi Annan, the UN Secretary General, dismayed UN officials, who had hoped...

President Jacques Chirac announced Thursday that France will immediately double to 400 troops its contingent in the U.N. peacekeeping force in Lebanon. The statement from Chirac's office came after he spoke by phone with U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan. France currently leads the UNIFIL force in southern Lebanon, and its decision-making on its role in a strengthened force has been closely watched. Chirac told Annan that France "will immediately double its current contribution by sending 200 men," the statement said. The plan will be presented at a U.N. meeting in New York later Thursday to flesh out which countries will participate...

AS Parisians crowd to the beaches in August, tourists are descending on the City of Light in droves, undeterred by a recent survey highlighting complaints that visitors get the cold shoulder from locals. The most visited country in the world, France received 76 million tourists last year, with Asians making up a growing proportion of those who came from non-European countries and 50,000 visitors jetting over every month from China alone. All this despite stereotyped images of rude waiters, bored shop assistants and impatient Parisians all too ready to give nervous tourists the brush off in rapid French. "French hospitality...

PARIS -- Tour de France winner Floyd Landis of the United States will learn at 5 a.m. ET on Saturday whether a test on his B sample confirms a positive test for the male sex hormone testosterone. "We will release a statement tomorrow," an International Cycling Union (ICU) spokesman said Friday. Saturday's announcement would cap a wild two weeks of accusations, speculation and denials, the latest of which is that dehydration might have caused Landis' elevated testosterone level. "Maybe a combination of dehydration, maximum effort," said Jose Maria Buxeda, one of Landis' Spanish lawyers, after testing began Thursday on the...

French fries are back on the menu in the US House of Representatives, three years after the name was ditched in favour of "freedom fries." House Republicans renamed fries and French toast in 2003 to protest at France's opposition to the war on Iraq. The patriotic name change hit the headlines at the time but the change back is getting much less coverage. A House official would only say that fries are no longer being offered under the "freedom" nomenclature. The Washington Times newspaper contacted aides of the two congressmen behind the move to "freedom fries " to see...

OSLO, Norway - A bus carrying 40 elderly French tourists toppled into a ditch by a motorway in central Norway on Tuesday after passengers demanded the driver get closer to a moose grazing by the roadside so they could take snapshots, police said. One woman suffered minor injuries in the accident on the motorway about 174 miles north of Oslo, the Norwegian capital. Eager to photograph the moose "in its natural environment," the tourists had asked the driver to get closer to the animal, after which the bus skidded off the edge of the motorway, district police officer at Gudbrandsdal,...

But we Americans seem to have short memories. What else could explain the fact that we, generally speaking, so-often lambaste the French, calling them “cowards” for not allying themselves fully with us in every instance? We constantly throw in their faces the fact that we came to their rescue in World Wars I and II. And we’ve all heard the jokes: “Surplus French military rifles for sale. Never fired. Dropped once.”

BERLIN (AP) -- Zinedine Zidane cut short his dazzling World Cup and closed his career with an ugly head butt -- and a loss. The France captain was given a red card for slamming the crown of his bald head into the center of Italy defender Marco Materazzi's chest after the two exchanged words while walking down the field in extra time. The game was tied 1-1 when Zidane was sent off, head bowed, in the 110th minute Sunday. Without their sharpshooting captain, France couldn't unlock Italy's defense and went on to lose in a shootout, 5-3. Zidane's strike was...

Last Updated: Wednesday, 31 May 2006, 07:46 GMT 08:46 UK Scientists reveal how frogs grip Tree frogs have a remarkable ability to stick The mystery of how frogs cling to surfaces - even if their feet are wet - may have been solved by scientists. A study of tree frogs has revealed their toe pads are covered in tiny bumps that can directly touch a surface to create friction. The scientists found this direct contact occurs even though the pads are covered with a film of watery mucus. The findings, published in the journal Interface, may aid the development of...

When there is a new outrage, I have to download some of my existing outrages, to make room. -- Al Gore CANNES, France -- What he wants you to know is that he has not made a political film. Al Gore's "An Inconvenient Truth" tries to move outside politics and focus on the facts of global warming. Gore says those facts are established, the returns are in, there is almost unanimous scientific agreement about them, and we may have about 10 years before the earth reaches a tipping point from which it cannot recover. He has been traveling the world...

France's prime minister said Thursday that military action is not the solution to the international standoff over Iran's nuclear program. French Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin said the war in Iraq should serve as a warning against attacking Iran. "My conviction is that military action is not the solution," Villepin said at a monthly news conference. "We have already lived through this type of scenario and we know that not only does it settle nothing, but it can raise risks. We have seen this in the most clear way with Iraq."

'I Ate Frogs And Lizards' Updated: 13:00, Friday April 14, 2006 A man who survived nearly three months alone in the Australian outback by eating lizards and frogs has spoken of his ordeal. Ricky Megee lost half his bodyweight during his stint in the desert, when he was forced to munch leeches and grasshoppers to stay alive. The 35-year-old was discovered looking like a "walking skeleton" by farm workers. He had set off on a 3,500-mile journey to take up a new job in Port Hedland, Western Australia, but never made it to his destination. Details of how he came...

LONDON (MarketWatch) -- Bowing to pressure from students and unions, French President Jacques Chirac on Monday unveiled plans to scrap a controversial youth-labor contract that spawned weeks of strikes and led to a complete political stalemate. The first-job contract, also known as CPE, will be replaced by an initiative focused on youths from troubled backgrounds. "The president of the republic has decided to replace Article 8 of the law on equal opportunities with measures in favor of the professional insertion of young people in difficulty," a statement from Chirac's office said. The move comes as a terrible blow to Prime...

THE French are arrogant, it is said, and when it comes from the mouth of a Frenchman, things get interesting. Even more so when the Frenchman, a wine producer from south-western France, delivers a red wine called Arrogant Frog to the Australian market. Jean-Claude Mas, a fourth-generation wine producer from the Languedoc region, admits the label, which arrived in Australia last year, is designed to be provocative. But it is also designed to help him penetrate an Australian industry battling a historic wine glut. But things are not as bad here as they are in France, which is what prompted...

World soccer's governing body has raised concerns with the Israeli government after the IDF targeted the main soccer stadium in the Gaza Strip with artillery fire. The shells, which reportedly left a large crater in the center of the field, were fired early last Friday morning in response to Kassam rocket attacks. Those attacks included one rocket that landed on a soccer field at Kibbutz Karmiya, south of Ashkelon, the day before. The IDF has acknowledged that the stadium was specifically targeted to "send a strong message to the Palestinian people against terrorism." "Knowing the stadium was unpopulated, artillery fire...

Sorry for the wierd post, but I went to check my hotmail and Firefox came up with a "Certificate warning" box. While it looked like i was going to hotmail via "secure.footprint", The certificate was actually linked to "gendarme.info." I looked at the detail and the organization which issued the cert showed "Gendarme Nationale"... So.. Have the frogs taken over hotmail security? Are cheese eating surrender monkeys hacking me? Or is this just your general web-based wierdness?

See for example this thread first. And now we have news that the French would rather riot than retrench The sight of the mobs Who are protesting jobs is nothing compared to the stench!