The French senate is set to consider a new counterterrorism bill to tackle extremism following a spate of terrorist attacks.
French interior minister Gerald Darmanin will present the new intelligence bill at a Cabinet meeting on Wednesday.
The bill was fast-tracked following the murder of teacher Samuel Paty last October and comes just days after a terror attack in Paris which saw a female police employee stabbed to death.
It will extend measures enabling authorities to shut down places of worship and better monitor those convicted of terrorism when they are released from prison.
President Emanuel Macron's government has introduced the legislation in a bid to tackle religious extremism.
The bill, which will allow the government to track foreign funding of mosques, has been condemned by some critics who see it as stigmatising Muslims.
On Friday, Mr Macron reaffirmed his commitment to tackling extremism and vowed to "never give in" in the fight against Islamist terrorism.
Mr Darmanin said the bill was needed to toughen anti-terrorist measures, including increased use of computer algorithms to detect potential terror threats among internet users.
"We are now dealing with isolated individuals, increasingly younger and unknown to intelligence services, and often without any links to established Islamist groups," he told the Journal du Dimanche newspaper.
The bill, which was being prepared prior to the latest attack, is aimed at strengthening the technological means the government can use to track messages on social media.
Mr Darmanin has cited the murder of Mr Paty as a reason for the bill after the intelligence services failed to spot the killer's contacts with Syria because he was using Instagram’s messaging service.
Earlier this year, parliamentarians in France's lower house backed the bill that President Macron said was designed to rid the country of extremism and protect French values.
The vote in the National Assembly house was the first critical hurdle for the legislation, where Mr Macron's party has a majority.
It will now go to the conservative-controlled Senate for approval.
The bill will see the period during which a convicted terrorist will be subjected to “administrative constraints” after leaving prison extended to two years from one.
It will also implement stricter monitoring of the country's mosques and schools.
Other elements include ensuring that children attend regular school from the age of three in a move to deter home-schooling where ideology is taught. All public employees will be trained in secularism.
Some critics say the bill singles out Muslims and intrudes on basic freedoms, and some accuse Mr Macron of pandering to right-wing voters before next year’s presidential election.
The issue of violence against police is likely to play a part in next year’s presidential election, as security and immigration are already top concerns.
Opinion polls show Mr Macron in a tough race against far-right leader Marine Le Pen, who after the attack accused the government of failing to "eradicate Islamism".
On Monday, 20 retired army generals and 80 others wrote an open letter to Mr Macron warning that France is "in danger" from Islamists.
“France is in danger. Several mortal perils are threatening her. Even in retirement, we remain soldiers of France and cannot in the current circumstances remain indifferent to the fate of our beautiful country,” the generals wrote.
They said that France was “disintegrating” under the influence of left-wing dogma.
Their appeal has been dismissed by officials, with Florence Parly, the defence minister, describing them as “retired soldiers who no longer have any role in our armed forces and only represent themselves”.
F1 The Movie
Starring: Brad Pitt, Damson Idris, Kerry Condon, Javier Bardem
Director: Joseph Kosinski
Rating: 4/5
Conflict, drought, famine
Estimates of the number of deaths caused by the famine range from 400,000 to 1 million, according to a document prepared for the UK House of Lords in 2024.
It has been claimed that the policies of the Ethiopian government, which took control after deposing Emperor Haile Selassie in a military-led revolution in 1974, contributed to the scale of the famine.
Dr Miriam Bradley, senior lecturer in humanitarian studies at the University of Manchester, has argued that, by the early 1980s, “several government policies combined to cause, rather than prevent, a famine which lasted from 1983 to 1985. Mengistu’s government imposed Stalinist-model agricultural policies involving forced collectivisation and villagisation [relocation of communities into planned villages].
The West became aware of the catastrophe through a series of BBC News reports by journalist Michael Buerk in October 1984 describing a “biblical famine” and containing graphic images of thousands of people, including children, facing starvation.
Band Aid
Bob Geldof, singer with the Irish rock group The Boomtown Rats, formed Band Aid in response to the horrific images shown in the news broadcasts.
With Midge Ure of the band Ultravox, he wrote the hit charity single Do They Know it’s Christmas in December 1984, featuring a string of high-profile musicians.
Following the single’s success, the idea to stage a rock concert evolved.
Live Aid was a series of simultaneous concerts that took place at Wembley Stadium in London, John F Kennedy Stadium in Philadelphia, the US, and at various other venues across the world.
The combined event was broadcast to an estimated worldwide audience of 1.5 billion.
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
In-demand jobs and monthly salaries
- Technology expert in robotics and automation: Dh20,000 to Dh40,000
- Energy engineer: Dh25,000 to Dh30,000
- Production engineer: Dh30,000 to Dh40,000
- Data-driven supply chain management professional: Dh30,000 to Dh50,000
- HR leader: Dh40,000 to Dh60,000
- Engineering leader: Dh30,000 to Dh55,000
- Project manager: Dh55,000 to Dh65,000
- Senior reservoir engineer: Dh40,000 to Dh55,000
- Senior drilling engineer: Dh38,000 to Dh46,000
- Senior process engineer: Dh28,000 to Dh38,000
- Senior maintenance engineer: Dh22,000 to Dh34,000
- Field engineer: Dh6,500 to Dh7,500
- Field supervisor: Dh9,000 to Dh12,000
- Field operator: Dh5,000 to Dh7,000
Killing of Qassem Suleimani
COMPANY%20PROFILE
%3Cp%3E%3Cstrong%3ECompany%20name%3C%2Fstrong%3E%3A%20ASI%20(formerly%20DigestAI)%3C%2Fp%3E%0A%3Cp%3E%3Cstrong%3EStarted%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%202017%3C%2Fp%3E%0A%3Cp%3E%3Cstrong%3EFounders%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%20Quddus%20Pativada%3C%2Fp%3E%0A%3Cp%3E%3Cstrong%3EBased%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%20Dubai%2C%20UAE%3C%2Fp%3E%0A%3Cp%3E%3Cstrong%3EIndustry%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%20Artificial%20intelligence%2C%20education%20technology%3C%2Fp%3E%0A%3Cp%3E%3Cstrong%3EFunding%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%20%243%20million-plus%3C%2Fp%3E%0A%3Cp%3E%3Cstrong%3EInvestors%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%20GSV%20Ventures%2C%20Character%2C%20Mark%20Cuban%3C%2Fp%3E%0A
Europe’s rearming plan
- Suspend strict budget rules to allow member countries to step up defence spending
- Create new "instrument" providing €150 billion of loans to member countries for defence investment
- Use the existing EU budget to direct more funds towards defence-related investment
- Engage the bloc's European Investment Bank to drop limits on lending to defence firms
- Create a savings and investments union to help companies access capital
Global state-owned investor ranking by size
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United States
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China
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UAE
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Japan
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5
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Norway
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Canada
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Singapore
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Australia
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Saudi Arabia
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South Korea
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