On July 7, the Paris Court of Appeals reduced the sentence of Marine Le Pen, leader of France’s National Rally, in a case involving the misuse of European Parliament funds, effectively paving the way for her to run in the 2027 French presidential election.
The court upheld the guilty verdict in the case involving the misuse of EU funds but reduced the ban on holding elected office from five years to 45 months, 30 of which are suspended. The remaining 15 months are considered to have already been served, so Le Pen regains the right to run for office.
The court also sentenced her to three years in prison, two of which are suspended, and one year to be served under house arrest with an electronic ankle monitor. Additionally, according to Le Monde, she was fined 100,000 euros.
Following the court’s decision, Le Pen stated that she would run in the 2027 presidential election and appeal the verdict to the French Court of Cassation. According to Reuters and AP, the appeal could suspend the portion of the sentence involving electronic monitoring, allowing her to campaign without immediate restrictions of this kind.
The case concerns the use of European Parliament funds between 2004 and 2016. Investigators alleged that money intended to pay for the work of European Parliament members’ assistants was used to fund party staff in France. Le Pen denies any wrongdoing and calls the case politically motivated.
The initial verdict, handed down in March 2025, threatened her participation in the presidential campaign, as the five-year ban on holding elected office effectively excluded her from the race. The National Rally had considered nominating Jordan Bardella as a contingency plan, but following the appeals court’s decision, Le Pen remains the party’s lead candidate.
The French presidential election is scheduled for 2027. Incumbent President Emmanuel Macron will not be able to run for another term, so the campaign is already being viewed as one of the most wide-open in recent years. Le Pen’s participation ensures that the National Rally retains its status as one of the key players in the upcoming race.
The Consulate General of Ukraine in Lyon will resume consular services for citizens starting July 9, following the completion of administrative procedures and technical preparations, the consulate announced on its official website.
Appointments will be scheduled via an online queue, and a separate appointment system is in place for vulnerable groups. The Consulate General urged Ukrainians to familiarize themselves in advance with the procedures for obtaining consular services and the document requirements.The consular district of the Consulate General of Ukraine in Lyon covers three regions of France: Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes, Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur, and Corsica. Citizens residing in these regions will be able to register for temporary and permanent consular registration, register the acquisition of Ukrainian citizenship by birth, and register adopted children.
At the same time, other consular services will be provided without restrictions based on place of residence in France. The Consulate General also clarified that foreign passports previously issued by the Embassy of Ukraine in France can only be obtained at the Embassy of Ukraine in France.
The Consulate General also plans to provide mobile consular services in remote cities with the highest concentration of Ukrainians. The first such visits are scheduled for September in Nice and October in Marseille. The possibility of providing mobile services in other cities may also be considered depending on the community’s needs.
The opening of the Consulate General in Lyon is expected to reduce the workload on the Embassy of Ukraine in France and simplify access to consular services for Ukrainians living in the southeastern part of the country, particularly in the regions of Lyon, Grenoble, Marseille, Nice, and Corsica.
According to Eurostat, as of April 30, 2026, there were 4.37 million non-EU citizens in the EU under temporary protection who had fled Ukraine due to the war; more than 98.5% of them were Ukrainian citizens. At the same time, regarding France, Eurostat specifically notes that its data typically does not include minors, so official statistics on temporary protection do not fully reflect the total size of the Ukrainian community in the country.
According to media estimates, there may be approximately 80,000–100,000 Ukrainians in France who left after the start of the full-scale war, although some of them have already transitioned from temporary protection to other legal statuses or have left the country.
CONSULAR SERVICES, consulate general, FRANCE, Lyon, UKRAINIAN
Ukrainian clinics have signed more than 100 memorandums of understanding as part of the international medical partnership program launched under the patronage of Ukraine’s First Lady Olena Zelenska.
According to the Ministry of Health, 26 of these memorandums were signed with medical institutions in France and are being implemented with the support of Expertise France, the French interministerial agency for international cooperation and development.
For example, as part of the partnership, the Chernihiv Regional Children’s Hospital is collaborating with the University Hospital of Lille, and the Chernihiv Regional Psychoneurological Hospital is collaborating with the University Hospital of Nîmes.
The Ministry of Health notes that in June 2024, the governments of Ukraine and France signed an intergovernmental grant agreement totaling 200 million euros, part of which is allocated to the healthcare sector and critical infrastructure: seven agreements in the healthcare sector have been signed, totaling 51 million euros. In addition, in 2024, the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine ratified framework agreements between Ukraine and France on cooperation in the reconstruction and modernization of hospitals and in oncology diagnostics.
FRANCE, international partnership, MEDICINE, Ministry of Health
France and Italy have opposed the European Union’s initiative to draft trade agreements exclusively in English in order to speed up the negotiation process, citing constitutional constraints and risks to the multilingual nature of EU institutions, the Financial Times reports.
According to the publication, EU Trade Commissioner Maroš Šefčovič proposed drafting the legal and technical “text” of a new trade agreement with Indonesia entirely in English, with the final text subsequently translated into all 24 official EU languages.
Typically, the process of finalizing trade agreements takes up to two years, as all changes must be agreed upon and implemented in all EU languages. The proposed approach, according to Šefčovič, should reduce the preparation time to one year.
He notes that delays in the process of concluding agreements lead to economic losses and postpone the benefits of trade agreements.
At the same time, France and Italy have expressed objections, citing constitutional provisions and the principle of multilingualism. A French official stated: “This is a matter of the French Constitution. France cannot be bound by or assume obligations under a text that is not drafted in French.”
However, according to sources, there is broad support among EU member states for the idea of accelerating agreement-conclusion procedures.
The European Commission notes that the use of English during the legal and technical drafting phase is standard practice in international negotiations and does not imply a refusal to translate the final documents.
Foreign direct investment (FDI) into China’s economy fell by 10.3% year-over-year in January–April, to 287.69 billion yuan ($42 billion), according to the Ministry of Commerce.
The manufacturing sector attracted 78.9 billion yuan, while the services sector attracted 204.2 billion yuan. Notably, investment in high-tech industries rose by 20.3% to reach 166.3 billion yuan.
Luxembourg more than doubled its FDI (by 110.3%), Switzerland increased it by 60.8%, France by 58.3%, and the U.S. by 24.5%, according to data from the ministry cited by Xinhua News Agency.
In January–April, 20,113 new enterprises with foreign capital were registered in China, which was 6.8% higher than the figure for the same period in 2025.
As reported, FDI for 2025 fell by 9.5% to 747.7 billion yuan.
French Justice Minister Gérald Darmanin has proposed imposing a temporary three-year moratorium on legal immigration, stating that the country has reached the limits of its capacity to integrate and assimilate newcomers.
According to Le Parisien, citing Darmanin’s interview with the Journal du Dimanche, the minister believes it is necessary to “put an end to immigration as it exists today.” He proposes suspending legal immigration for three years and reforming the Constitution to introduce binding, rather than merely advisory, quotas on the entry of foreigners.
Darmainin had previously advocated for a temporary suspension of regular immigration for two to three years. This would apply to labor migration and family reunification, though exceptions could be maintained for doctors, researchers, and certain categories of students. Following the moratorium, the minister proposed transitioning to a system of immigration quotas, the volume of which would be determined after consultation with citizens.
Darmann’s proposal has not yet been adopted as state policy. Its implementation would require a political decision, a legislative process, and, according to the minister himself, a constitutional amendment. However, the initiative signals an intensification of the migration debate in France ahead of the 2027 presidential election.
Potential restrictions could affect several key channels of legal entry: labor migration, certain student programs, and family reunification. At the same time, France faces a shortage of foreign workers in medicine, science, certain service sectors, and professions with labor shortages, making a potential moratorium politically and economically contentious.
The issue of migration remains a central one in French domestic politics. According to Le Monde, in 2025 the country issued over 380,000 initial residence permits to citizens of non-EU countries, an 11% increase from the previous year. About half of the new permits were issued to students and for humanitarian reasons: international students received about 118,000 permits, humanitarian categories—about 92,000, family migration accounted for about 91,000, while professional immigration fell by nearly 13%—to approximately 51,000 permits.
Historically, the overall structure of immigration to France has been dominated by people from North Africa and Southern Europe. According to data cited by The Connexion based on INSEE, among immigrants by country of birth, the largest groups are those from Algeria—12.4%, Morocco—11.7%, Portugal—7.3%, Tunisia (4.9%), Italy (3.6%), Turkey (3.4%), and Spain (3.1%). These seven countries account for 46.4% of all immigrants in France.
Ukrainians occupy a distinct place in France’s current migration landscape as recipients of temporary protection following the start of Russia’s full-scale war against Ukraine. According to Eurostat, as of the end of March 2026, 4.33 million Ukrainian citizens and residents were granted temporary protection in EU countries. The largest countries hosting refugees were Germany, Poland, and the Czech Republic. Eurostat’s country-specific tables for France as of March 2026 indicate approximately 70,700 people under temporary protection.
For France, a potential moratorium would mark one of the most drastic shifts in migration policy in recent years. For businesses, it could mean more difficult access to foreign labor; for universities, the risk of a reduction in international enrollment; and for family-based immigration programs, additional uncertainty. At the same time, Ukrainians under temporary protection are governed by a separate European regime that operates within the framework of EU decisions and is not considered ordinary labor or family-based immigration.
