(Bloomberg) French far-right leader Marine Le Pen went into damage-control mode on Tuesday, after lending support to a group of soldiers and retired generals who penned an open letter to President Emmanuel Macron warning of a risk of “civil war” and the looming disintegration of the country.
In an interview on FranceInfo Tuesday, Le Pen denied the officers had effectively threatened a coup d’etat, before reeling off what she called a number of threats to the Republic, including rising crime in the suburbs.
“We ask you to apply the law, that’s what they are saying,” Le Pen said.
The controversial column was published last week by Valeurs Actuelles, a far-right weekly that has been moving from the fringes toward the mainstream ever since 2019, when Macron gave it an interview to discuss Islam and immigration.
