A FRENCH woman discovered her 42-year-old son had been buried in the same cemetery where she was attending her brother’s funeral, after she had tried to invite him to the ceremony, a newspaper said yesterday.

POLICE yesterday probed allegations that President Nicolas Sarkozy’s election campaign received illegal donations from France’s richest woman throwing up the biggest crisis of his mandate.

French justice minister Rachida Dati is to run in the European elections in June, officials said tonight.

French police have confirmed that eight people - not six, as previously reported - have been taken hostage in a bank south of Paris.

At least six people were being held hostage by armed robbers south of Paris this morning, television networks reported.

At least six people were being held hostage in a hold-up south of Paris this morning, television networks reported.

Attackers, some carrying handguns, torched buses in three overnight attacks in suburban Paris, as the nation faced the one-year anniversary of riots in France’s down-and-out, heavily immigrant neighbourhoods.