Tag: france

French Newspaper Le Monde FINALLY Discovers That the Ukrainian Army Is Rife With Neo-Nazis – Hundreds of Soldiers From 3rd Assault Brigade Openly Display 3rd Reich Symbols

It’s like they say: better late than never.

The western media has been willingly blind to one of the worst-kept geopolitical secrets of our times: that the heroic ‘defenders of democracy’ in Ukraine are, in many cases, a bunch of Neo-Nazis running around unchecked.

The French premier newspaper Le Monde has just released the result of a 10-day investigation on the 3rd assault brigade of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, and to their ‘surprise’ and dismay found out that the militants go around openly and proudly wearing neo-Nazi symbols.

Of course, no one needed the Le Monde deep dive, since the information is readily available about the Nazi Azov Brigades and their heirs of the 3rd assault brigade.

And, what’s more, no one is hiding the fact that the Nazi collaborator and war criminal Stephan Bandera has been turned into a Ukrainian national hero.

Just between us: they don’t make much of an effort to hide their extremist ideologies.

Slavyangrad reported:

“According to Le Monde, hundreds of servicemen of the 3rd Assault Brigade — the direct heirs of the Azov Regiment — continue to openly use Nazi symbols. The photo shows swastikas, greeting gestures, and SS emblems.

Despite the ‘reform’ and the formal inclusion of the brigade in the Ukrainian Armed Forces, radical symbols have not disappeared. Journalists note: this is not a matter of chance, but of a conscious choice – either based on ideological convictions or as a tool of intimidation.

On June 14, in Kiev, on the day of the ‘March of Equality’ [Gay Pride], radicals from the ‘Carpathian Sich’ held an alternative ‘March of Tradition’. Participants were captured on camera demonstrating a Nazi salute.”

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France Pushes Digital ID Check Laws For Platforms Like Reddit and Bluesky

Efforts by the French government to combat online access to pornography are quickly turning into a broader push to dismantle online anonymity, raising significant alarm among privacy advocates.

Authorities are now considering applying harsh age-verification mandates not just to explicit sites, but also to social networks like Reddit, Mastodon, and Bluesky, platforms where adult content may appear but where identity is not typically tethered to real-world credentials.

The shift doesn’t involve new legislation, but a reinterpretation of existing laws under France’s recently enacted regulations. This would allow the state to brand platforms that “enable the sharing of pornographic content” as porn sites, subjecting them to some of the most invasive digital ID checks yet proposed in the EU.

Digital Minister Clara Chappaz’s office stated, “Our focus is age verification for any platform that distributes or enables the sharing of pornographic content.”

Though framed as a move to protect children, the implications extend well beyond youth safety. Any service caught in this net would be forced to track the age, and by extension, the identity, of its users, undermining pseudonymity and threatening to make anonymous online activity impossible in practice.

The government’s renewed urgency follows the tragic killing of a teaching assistant in a high school, which President Emmanuel Macron used to reemphasize his call to ban social media for users under 15. While unrelated to pornography, the incident is being used to justify sweeping controls over digital spaces.

Platforms that fail to comply with the new age-check rules risk being fined, blacklisted by search engines, or even blocked entirely. Chappaz recently signaled that Elon Musk’s X is close to being designated as a pornographic platform, despite its primary function as a text-based social media site, highlighting how blurry and expansive the government’s definitions have become.

However, the legal path is anything but clear. Under the EU’s Digital Services Act (DSA), decisions over “Very Large Online Platforms” rest with the European Commission, not individual member states.

These platforms are expected to assess and mitigate risks, including those tied to adult content, but retain discretion on how to do so. A legal review in France is reportedly underway, signaling the state’s intent to push this policy despite potential conflicts with EU law.

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France considers requiring Musk’s X to verify users’ age

The French government is considering designating X as a porn platform — a move that will likely have the platform implementing strict age verification requirements.

Such a designation could effectively ban children from accessing the social media app unless it curtailed adult content. Paris has recently upped its efforts to protect kids online by requiring age verification by porn platforms.

“X has indicated since 2024 that it accepts the distribution of pornographic content. It must therefore be treated as such,” Digital Minister Clara Chappaz’s office told POLITICO.

Her team has been tasked with “examining the designation of X in the decree concerning pornographic sites that must verify the age of their users.”

The confirmation follows an appearance by Chappaz on French TV show “Quotidien” on Thursday evening, where she said X will soon receive “the same pretty papers as YouPorn” instructing X to ban adult content or implement age screening.

Porn platforms serving content in France are required to implement age verification measures with a final deadline of June 7, although some are protesting.

Failure to comply could see sites fined, delisted from search engines or blocked completely.

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France Just Redefined Global Speech on TikTok

TikTok’s decision to block the “SkinnyTok” hashtag across its entire platform followed direct intervention from the French government, revealing how national pressure is increasingly shaping global online speech, even when the content in question is not illegal.

French Digital Minister Clara Chappaz just claimed victory, celebrating the platform’s removal of the term often associated with extreme dieting and weight loss trends. “This is a first collective victory,” she wrote on X after TikTok confirmed the ban was now global.

A spokesperson for the platform stated the hashtag was removed as part of ongoing safety reviews and due to its“link to “unhealthy weight loss content.”

While the move has been portrayed as a step forward for user safety, particularly for young audiences, it also raises deeper concerns about the role of governments in controlling speech on private platforms.

The “SkinnyTok” content, though considered by some to be harmful, does not violate any laws. Still, the French government managed to pressure TikTok into removing it worldwide. This maneuver highlights a growing trend in which authorities seek to influence online content standards beyond their own borders, often using platforms as enforcers.

Rather than work through the European Commission or wait for outcomes from the ongoing investigation under the Digital Services Act (DSA), France chose to confront TikTok directly.

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French experts fled Newsom’s project, said California was ‘more dysfunctional’ than North Africa…

This story’s a couple years old, but it’s making the rounds again, and the timing couldn’t be better, with Gavin Newsom likely eyeing a 2028 presidential run.

It’s a perfect snapshot of the political dysfunction rotting this country from the inside out, especially in California. Remember the infamous California bullet train debacle? The one that was supposed to be a marvel of American infrastructure but turned into a flaming dung heap of taxpayer waste?

READ MORE: Why are these Biden-era weaponized DOJ cases still going strong under Trump?

Here’s a quick update on the fiasco, which is now a full decade behind schedule and $10 billion over budget.

Kevin Dalton:

Gavin Newsom 2010: California is going to get it right with this new high speed rail. Reality 2024: The $33 BILLION high speed rail from Los Angeles to San Francisco to be completed in 2020 is now a $128 BILLION train from Bakersfield to Merced with no expected date of completion. Trump 2025: Shut it down

Newsom, the former mayor of San Francisco, has been trying – and failing – to build this railway for a ridiculous 17 years.

And yet, nobody seems to know where all that money went.

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France BANS smoking in nearly all outdoor spaces

France will ban smoking in all outdoor places that can be frequented by children, like beaches, parks and bus stops, the health and family minister said on Thursday.

‘Where there are children, tobacco must disappear,’ Catherine Vautrin said in an interview published by regional outlet Ouest-France.

The restrictions will come into force on July 1, and failure to comply with the draconian ban could result in a £114 fine, the minister said, adding that children have the ‘right to breathe clean air.’

Cigarettes will also be banned in areas close to schools to prevent students from ‘smoking in front of their establishments.’ 

The ban does not apply to cafe terraces – or include electronic cigarettes. 

The government’s National Anti-Tobacco Programme for 2023 to 2027 proposed a smoking ban similar to the one announced by Vautrin, calling for France to ‘rise to the challenge of a tobacco-free generation from 2032.’ 

But anti-tobacco organisations had voiced concern the authorities were dragging their feet on implementing the measures. 

Vautrin said there were no plans to place additional taxes on cigarettes ‘at the moment’. 

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French Leftist Anarchists Claim Responsibility for Cannes Power Outage Sabotage

Far-left anarchists have claimed responsibility for sabotage attacks on electrical systems and causing power outages in Southern France over the weekend, including at the Cannes Film Festival.

Posting on the far-left online platform IndyMedia, an anonymous group of anarcho-radicals claimed to have sabotaged key electrical infrastructure over the weekend, which left around 160,00 people without power in the Alpes-Maritimes department and around 45,000 in Nice.

The suspected sabotage attacks began in the late hours of Friday evening and continued through Sunday, briefly impacting the closing of the Cannes Film Festival, which the leftist arsonists branded an “obscene ceremony by a sea that has become a refugee cemetery.” However, the event organisers were able to run the programme off backup generators, and therefore, the finale was ultimately uninterrupted.

The supposed saboteurs, who described themselves as “two bands of anarchists”, said that their intention was to both interrupt the film festival as well as shut off power to Thales Alenia Space and other French defence contractors in the region, which they accused of fostering a world which “will not stop bombing, exploiting, extracting, grabbing, raping, ravaging, starving, machine-gunning, polluting, and exterminating, until everything is under its control.”

They accused the French government of being hypocritical, saying that while it preaches the principles of “progress on the international scene,” it is the second-largest arms exporter in the world behind the United States.

“French excellence in this area arms NATO and sows death, from Yemen to Gaza, from Ukraine to the Sahel,” they said, adding that the defence firms in the Cannes region employ thousands of engineers and technicians who “work there daily to develop these military (observation, communication, missile and drone guidance) and civilian (telecommunications, surveillance) satellites.”

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Outrage as British Trawler Detained by French Navy Days After PM Starmer Betrays Fishing Industry in His ‘Brexit Reset’

Failing British Prime Minister is under fire for his ‘Brexit Reset’ deal with the European Union, in which he basically sold out his Fishing Industries by allowing EU boats unfettered access to the UK’s waters for the next 12 years.

The situation became even more volatile after a British trawler was held in French custody yesterday (24) after it was allegedly caught operating without a license in the English Channel.

Daily Mail reported:

“The Lady T, which is based in Eastbourne, East Sussex, was being held in Boulogne-Sur-Mer on Saturday and now risks being confiscated. She was caught by the Pluvier, a French Navy ship, on Thursday, and the catamaran’s skipper now faces prosecution for fishing for whelks without a license.”

This comes days after Starmer closed a deal with the EU on fishing rights which is seen as hugely favoring the French.

The French Navy’s ‘public service patrol vessel’, the Pluvier, was inspecting in the French Exclusive Economic Zone.

French Maritime Authority spokesman: “’During this operation, which was part of the State’s maritime enforcement, a British fishing vessel was inspected by sailors from the Navy patrol vessel while fishing without a license in French waters.

‘As the offence was proved, the fishing vessel was diverted during the night of May 23rd to the port of Boulogne-Sur-Mer, following the instructions of the Delegate for the Sea and Coastline, acting on behalf of the Regional Prefect, who oversees the fisheries police, for the purpose of initiating prosecution under the authority of the Public Prosecutor.’”

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French justice minister calls for abolishing cash

France’s Justice Minister Gerald Darmanin has proposed abolishing cash transactions, arguing that digital payments – including cryptocurrencies – are much easier to trace than physical money and would help authorities combat drug trafficking and other criminal activity.

Restrictions on cash transactions in France and across the EU have already tightened in recent years.

Speaking before a Senate commission on Thursday, Darmanin said that “a large part of daily delinquency and even criminal networks rely on cash,” and declared that “the end of cash would prevent the establishment of drug dealing points.”

Darmanin, who previously oversaw public finances as Minister of Public Action and Accounts, acknowledged that banning physical money wouldn’t eliminate the drug trade, but insisted that “once the money is traceable,” it becomes “more complicated” for both consumers and dealers to escape financial oversight.

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George Simion files a formal request with the Constitutional Court to annul the elections, accusing France and Moldova of electoral manipulation.

George Simion, presidential candidate and vice president of the European Conservatives and Reformists (ECR) Party, has filed a formal petition with Romania’s Constitutional Court to annul the May 2025 presidential elections, citing massive foreign interference that he claims compromised the sovereign will of the Romanian people.

Simion, who secured the support of more than 5.3 million voters in an extremely tight race, shared an exclusive press release directly with Gateway Hispanic, detailing allegations of electoral manipulation.

In this document, the patriotic leader denounces the intervention of both state and non-state actors—primarily from France and Moldova—in a coordinated effort to manipulate institutions, control media narratives, and impose an electoral outcome that does not reflect the people’s will.

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