00:00And joining me in the studio is French politics editor Marc Perriman.
00:03I imagine, Marc, the pressure on far-left leader Jean-Luc Mélenchon is growing by the minute.
00:08Absolutely. And you saw those images of Mélenchon really retorting to all the accusations
00:15because obviously everyone, and not only on the far right, which is to be expected,
00:21but also you heard government ministers saying that clearly he had a responsibility,
00:30not a direct responsibility, but probably a moral responsibility.
00:35This is obviously something that's not accepted by the French unbound leader,
00:41all the MPs, the others, and especially the MP Wiesel, who was the founder of this group, the Young Guard.
00:49The problem is that Raphael Arnaud, this MP, his attaché in Parliament,
00:58has been pointed as a potential participant in the fight.
01:04We'll have more details because the prosecutor is supposed to give a press conference at 4 p.m. Paris time
01:10today.
01:11But already there are allegations that he might have been involved,
01:16and he himself said that he would withdraw from his official functions during the investigation.
01:23And a few minutes ago, the Speaker of the National Assembly, Yael Brun-Pivet,
01:27said that he was barred from entering the National Assembly, not because he was guilty,
01:33but that this could create further tensions, because if he appears in the National Assembly,
01:38other MPs might not appreciate it, and this could be feisty.
01:44So clearly, there's a lot of tension on France and Baal, because it has ties to this group,
01:52and we'll have to wait.
01:54But if they were indeed involved in this tragic killing, this would probably hurt the far left.
02:03Let's not forget that just a few days ago, France and Baal was qualified as extreme left by the French
02:11authorities.
02:13They totally reject that allegation.
02:16The French president, in an interview yesterday, said yes for himself.
02:21France and Baal was on the far left, and he also accused them of being outside the Republican realm,
02:28especially because of alleged anti-Semitic tendencies and declarations.
02:34And of course, the big question is, what impact is this going to have on municipal elections here in France
02:40next month?
02:41Well, obviously, yes, we're entering the last stage before those elections.
02:46Those are, first and foremost, local elections.
02:49If they were national elections, it would probably have more of an impact.
02:53But obviously, in Lyon, where this took place, this could have an impact, but this is going to hurt, obviously,
03:00France and Baal,
03:02because they had decided to make those elections an important one,
03:06because they had generally neglected the municipal election.
03:10They said, our fight is the presidential election, the legislative election.
03:15This is how we need to really impose ourselves.
03:19And the municipal election is about local issues.
03:22That's not so much what we care about.
03:24This year, they said they realized that they probably were wrong in not having a strong local implantation.
03:30And so they were betting on those local elections to really start gaining some traction from the bottom up.
03:39So this could indeed hurt them.
03:42Obviously, we'll have to wait what happens then.
03:45There'll be a few weeks, and maybe they'll be able to distance themselves from what happened just a few days
03:53ago in Lyon.
03:54But clearly, this is a stain on their reputation, and it could hurt their prospects.
04:00Mark Perriman, thank you for that.
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