Two a penny

.The French football match between Marseille and Paris Saint Germain was postponed overnight after players contracted swine flu according to a source close to Marseille.
Paris Saint-Germain had on Saturday confirmed that its former France international attacking midfielder Ludovic Giuly and defender Mamadou Sakho had contracted swine flu. One of these was believed to be striker Louis Arnaud.
It was then announced on Sunday that midfielder Jeremy Clement had also contracted the virus and there were fears that two of the rest of the squad had symptoms of the illness. .
The squad had been visited on Sunday morning by a French Football Federation doctor and the players are taking an anti-swine flu drug as a preventive measure.
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The revelations were made in a 2005 autobiography The Bad Life and have surfaced after Mitterrand passionately defended film-maker Roman Polanski, who faces deportation from Switzerland were he was arrested to the United States for having had sex with a 13-year-old girl in 1977.0pt
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A senior aide to French President Nicolas Sarkozy on Thursday defended Culture Minister Frederic Mitterrand who is facing calls for his resignation for having written about paying boys for sex.

Politicians from all parties have criticised Mitterrand for his attack on the United States.

French political debate sometimes takes on a pathetic form. The far-right National Front party has called for him to step down.

Asked whether Mitterrand should resign, he said: When there is a controversy as pathetic as this, with so much delay, I don&rsquot think there should be such drastic consequences. It excessive and quite undignified, Sarkozy adviser Henri Guaino said on France 2 television.

The experiences in the book are presented as a mixture of straight autobiography and more dreamlike reflection.

Guaino said there were no facts to back up the accusations and Mitterrand had not been subject to any legal complaints.

I got into the habit of paying for boys, Mitterrand wrote, adding that his attraction to young male prostitutes continued even though he knew the sordid details of this traffic.

I got into the habit of paying for boys, Mitterrand wrote, adding that his attraction to young male prostitutes continued even though he knew the sordid details of this traffic…

Mitterrand is the nephew of former Socialist President Francois Mitterrand and was drafted into Sarkozy centre-right cabinet in June. the abundance of very attractive and immediately available young boys put me in a state of desire. Sarkozy was delighted to have brought him on board, but now faces unease within his own UMP party over his choice of minister.

Although he was not a Socialist, his surname still reverberates in France and carries a lot of clout. .

France considers itself to be at the forefront of the fight against sex tourism but Guaino said Mitterrand would not compromise this position.

Although still openly siding with Polanski, Mitterrand has toned down his language, saying his emotions overtook him the day he heard that Switzerland had arrested the film director.

Interior Minister Brice Hortefeux said Mitterrand was respected for his competence in the role of culture minister.

Frédéric Mitterrand – French politics

.Poland’s Robert Kubica will replace Spain’s double Formula One world champion Fernando Alonso at Renault next season, the team said in a statement.
No details were given about the length of the contract, although Renault said it was from 2010 onwards.
The Pole won last year’s Canadian Grand Prix and had been approached by several teams, including Toyota and Williams, once BMW announced they were quitting the sport at the end of the season.
Kubica has driven for the BMW-Sauber team since 2006 while Alonso, one of the 24-year-old’s best friends in the paddock, is moving to Ferrari next year.
“I feel I have a special connection with this team because in 2005 I won the World Series by Renault.
“I am very happy I will be joining Renault in the 2010 season,” Kubica said.
“I share with Renault a strong winning mentality and feel comfortable with their friendly and open attitude.
“This gave me the chance to test with the team in Barcelona, which led to my debut in Formula One.”
Former champions Renault are licking their wounds after a scandal-hit year, with the team handed a suspended permanent ban from the sport for their role in a race-fixing controversy.
“I’m highly motivated and optimistic that together we can be at the front of the grid next year and, hopefully, fighting for the world title.
Kubica, an extremely quick and aggressive driver, has a no-nonsense style that will fit in well with the team’s restructuring.
Flamboyant former team boss Flavio Briatore has been banned for life and engineering head Pat Symonds barred for five years.
Although he had an impressive first test with Renault, he was snapped up by BMW-Sauber from under their noses as a test driver.
The tall Pole has also come up the hard way, with no family wealth to support him and from a country with no previous involvement in Formula One.
“Ever since Robert made his grand prix debut in 2006, he has been on our radar as one of the most naturally talented drivers of his generation,” said Renault’s acting team principal Bob Bell.
He then replaced Canada’s 1997 world champion Jacques Villeneuve as a race driver halfway through 2006.
“Renault has high ambitions and hopes for the future of the team and we feel that Robert can play a big role in fulfilling them.
“He has delivered on that promise so it’s great to have secured him in one of our cars next season. .”
Renault did not mention the second driver, currently French rookie Romain Grosjean

.Three French soldiers died in a lightning storm during an operation targeting Taliban bomb squads in the east of Afghanistan, the French military said.
One was killed by lightning and two others drowned, spokesman for the French armed forces general staff, Admiral Christophe Prazuck, said.
The fourth French soldier died when the armoured vehicle he was travelling in fell into a ravine in Surobi district.
In all seven NATO soldiers, including four French service personnel,died this weekend in Afghanistan, NATO and other authorities say.
In the first incident on Saturday, an American soldier died of wounds sustained when an improvised-explosive device (IED) detonated in southern Afghanistan, the force said. Five other French soldiers were also hurt, some of them seriously, the French military in Kabul said.
And a British soldier died on Sunday after a roadside explosion in the south, London’s Ministry of Defence said. .
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France has now lost 35 soldiers in Afghanistan, where it has 2,900 troops in the NATO-led coalition battling Taliban guerrillas and training Afghanistan’s national security forces

.The leaders of the United States, Britain and France have threatened tough new sanctions against Iran after it was publicly revealed last night that Tehran is building a second nuclear enrichment plant.
The plant’s size and structure according to US intelligence is consistent with enriching fuel to make nuclear weapons.
The three leaders threatened to hold Iran accountable if it failed to disclose all of its nuclear program.
British Prime Minister Gordon Brown says the Iranian Government has been lying to the international community.
Iranian officials confirmed the country was building another enrichment plant, but Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad denied it was hiding anything from nuclear inspectors. .
“Confronted by the serial deception of many years, the international community has no choice but to draw a line in the sand,” he said.
“The level of deception by the Iranian Government will shock and anger the whole international community and it will harden out resolve.
Mr Sarkozy says Iran has just two months to comply with the international demands.”
In a clear show of transatlantic unity, US President Barack Obama, French President Nicolas Sarkozy and Mr Brown appeared jointly to disclose Iran’s secret enrichment plant.
“We cannot let the Iranian leaders gain time while the motors are running.
“Everything must be on the table now,” he said.”
The US has been monitoring the secret nuclear site for years, but Iran found out, forcing Mr Obama to go public with the explosive new intelligence.
“If by December there is not an in depth change by the Iranian leaders, sanctions will have to be taken.
“Iran has a right to peaceful nuclear power that meets the energy needs of its people, but the size and configuration of the facility is inconsistent with a peaceful program,” he said.
“Iran has a right to peaceful nuclear power that meets the energy needs of its people, but the size and configuration of the facility is inconsistent with a peaceful program,” he said.
China, also with a veto on the council, is reported to be still digesting the news.
Russia with a veto on the UN Security Council has financial and military trade ties with Iran and has been reluctant to impose economic sanctions on Iran, but Mr Medvedev agreed that IAEA must now be allowed to inspect the site.
He confirmed the existence of the facility but said it would not be operational for 18 months, and so Iran had not violated any international requirements.
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, still in New York for the UN General Assembly meeting said Iran was keeping nothing from inspectors.
Mr Obama says he will pursue dialogue with any leader, including Iran’s, but director of the Heritage Foundation Dr Nile Gardiner says that is now going to be difficult.
Next week the five veto-wielding powers on the Security Council, plus Germany, are scheduled to hold talks with the Iranians, but today’s disclosure of the enrichment plant sounds more like the end of negotiations rather than a beginning.
The Obama administration is pessimistic about next week’s talks with the Iranians, and with a short timeline the UN is likely to be considering a resolution in November.
“There will now be calls I think on Capitol Hill for a far tougher approach be taken towards Iran, including potentially the use of force as a last resort against Iran’s nuclear facilities,” he said.

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REUTERS -

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France disputed Internet piracy law, which will allow authorities to disconnect repeat illegal downloaders, was finally approved in parliament on Tuesday but the opposition immediately announced a fresh court challenge. .

The opposition Socialists, who took the previous version of the so-called Hadopi law to the constitutional court, said they would mount a second challenge.

The bill, revised after France top constitutional court overturned an earlier version voted in June, cleared its last parliamentary hurdle when it was passed in the joint legislative committee of the two houses by 258 votes to 131.

Culture Minister Frederic Mitterrand, who steered the second version of the bill through parliament, said the law would prevent pillage of works of art by demagogues who say that works of art should be free just because they were on the web.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy has thrown his weight behind the law and has been backed by the recording and film industries, which say they have lost millions of euros through illegal Internet downloads.

But the law, which will set up a new regulatory body with the power to investigate suspected illegal downloaders and recommend sanctions, has also been heavily criticised by consumer groups as well as the opposition.

Freedom is not free licence, liberalism isn&rsquot the jungle, he told the committee.

The previous version of the law was watered down after the constitutional court rejected a text that would have created a body with the power to cut Internet access for those found guilty of illegal downloads.

They say it will be ineffective in combating determined pirates and will impose unduly harsh punishment on ordinary Internet users.

The sanctions imposed by a judge could also include fines of up to 30,000 euros ($44,420).

The constitutional court ruled that the new body could only have the power to issue warnings and that any disconnections could only be ordered by a judge after two written warnings from the new authority.

Mitterrand said he expected the main effect of the law to be dissuasive and he expected actual sanctions to be rare.

The law will also oblige anyone with a wi-fi connection to block non-authorised users from using the connection.

France – Internet – legislation – piracy
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France attempt to curb Internet piracy has attracted wide interest outside the country as the media industry worldwide has struggled to come up with a response to the challenge to traditional record and film sales posed by the Internet

.French riot police have evacuated at least 150 Afghan boys and men from the “jungle”, a makeshift migrant camp on the Channel coast.
Riot police took up positions at dawn outside the tent city on a patch of sandy scrubland in Calais as the remaining migrants gathered behind banners with slogans pleading with the French authorities for shelter and protection.
Police led out the migrants one by one who followed without resistance amid the angry shouts of the protesters and with dozens of journalists examining on.
As the first dozen officers entered the camp a small group of rights activists formed a human chain trying to bar access to the migrants, shouting “no border, no nation, stop deportation”.
But government officials say the Calais “jungle” has become a haven for people-smuggling gangs and a no-go zone for locals, with appalling sanitary conditions blamed for an outbreak of scabies in the past few months. .
Aid groups also say the crackdown will simply push migrants further underground, making them more vulnerable to traffickers and criminal gangs.
From a peak of 700 mostly Afghan Pashtuns based in the “jungle” in June, aid groups say two thirds have fled since the government indicated it would close the camp in April.
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Renault’s future in Formula One hung in the balance Monday as the French carmaker’s race team faced the sport’s governing body, the International Automobile Federation (FIA), on charges it fixed last year’s Singapore Grand Prix.

Some fear that a stiff sanction could push the French manufacturer, which has been hit like the rest of the car industry by a sharp drop in sales due to the recession, into following Honda and BMW out of Fomula One.

Outgoing FIA boss Max Mosley last week raised the spectre of a total and permanent exclusion of the team, which is a central player in a sport whose reputation has suffered from repeated cheating scandals. Total. . That’s the worst that could happen, he said when asked what the toughest sanction could be. Exclusion forever, gone, finished.

Entrenched corruption

Ari Vatanen, a former rally champion who is in a run-off with Mosley’s preferred candidate Jean Todt in next month’s FIA presidential election, told UK newspaper the Sunday Telegraph that corruption was so entrenched in Formula One a total break from the existing system may be the only way forward.

The image of the sport has been battered recently.

What is occuring here with Renault is more than just the tip of the iceberg, it is symptomatic of a wider problem, he told the newspaper. We have gone from ‘Spygate’ to ‘Crashgate’ with many other things in between. Look at all the leaked dossiers. They do not trust it and who can blame them. What the public see is a corrupt sport.

In 2007 British team McLaren-Mercedes was fined 100 million euros for spying on Ferrari, a fine that would surely sink cash-strapped Renault Formula One ambitions given that the company has suffered heavily from falling sales.

In 2007 British team McLaren-Mercedes was fined 100 million euros for spying on Ferrari, a fine that would surely sink cash-strapped Renault Formula One ambitions given that the company has suffered heavily from falling sales. Piquet has been offered immunity from prosecution.

Team boss Flavio Briatore and engineering head Pat Symonds have already quit and will not attend the hearing at the FIA headquarters.

The FIA could decide to permanently exclude the former world champions, but a heavy fine or a suspended ban appear more likely despite the unprecedented nature of the offence.

The FIA has said it has no reason to suspect that double world champion Alonso, who is widely expected to move to Ferrari next year, knew anything of the plot seemingly agreed upon by the two team bosses and Piquet.

Formula One – Renault

.France has defended its decision to close a makeshift migrant camp in Calais, saying it has become a haven for people-smuggling gangs and a no-go zone for local people.
The camp known as “The Jungle” houses up to 2,000 migrants, many of them from Somalia, Darfur, Iraq, and Afghanistan.
Every night many of them attempt to cross into England by jumping on trucks or boarding trains going through the Channel Tunnel.
They live there in unsanitary conditions in makeshift tents and shelters. .
French immigration minister Eric Besson said the decision to close the camp next week would send a strong message to people-traffickers that the route from Calais to Britain is shut

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French photographer Willy Ronis died on Saturday aged 99, according to Rapho, the photographic agency he had been under contract with in recent years.

Ronis, who was confined to a wheelchair, was weakened by the dialysis treatment he was regularly submitted to and old age, said Stephane Ledoux, the head of Eyedea Press, which owns both Rapho and Gamma. His art was profoundly truthful and humanist.

But his mind stayed clear and sparkling till the end, Ledoux said.

photography – the arts
. He was one of the best photographers of all time and offered us a unique perspective on France