SMOKING will be illegal in French cafes, bars and restaurants from January, 2008 under a ban announced by Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin.

France’s prime minister Dominique de Villepin has announced a ban on smoking in public places.

French President Jacques Chirac today appealed to the United States to speed up its response to Arab nations’ demands for changes to a UN resolution on ending the Middle East crisis.

FRENCH Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin is facing a fresh battle to keep his job following accusations that he contributed to a smear campaign against his chief rival for the presidency, Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy.

FRENCH President Jacques Chirac yesterday threw out part of a youth labour law that triggered massive protests and strikes, bowing to intense pressure from students and unions and dealing a blow to his loyal premier in a bid to end the crisis.

DEMONSTRATORS opposed to a new jobs law swarmed parts of downtown Paris last night throwing stones, tearing down street signs and ripping up park benches.

FRENCH protesters declared themselves on the brink of victory yesterday in their battle against the controversial ‘first employment’ labour law.

FRENCH Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin has conceded he made errors in his management of a hotly contested youth labour law that sent one million protesting students and union members into the streets.

UNION leaders failed in talks yesterday to force French Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin to withdraw a divisive new jobs law and said they would go ahead with plans for a nationwide strike next week.

FRENCH unions and Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin agreed to meet today over a contested jobs law as protesters clashed with police in Paris and other cities.

More than 500,000 students and workers marched in Paris and other French cities today in the biggest show of anger yet at a jobs plan that has led to street violence and threatens to weaken the government.

FRENCH police used tear gas when violence erupted as students turned up the heat on Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin over a jobs law yesterday.

French Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin today announced tightened controls on immigration, part of his government’s response to France’s worst civil unrest in four decades.

Rioters defied emergency laws that took effect today as they looted and burned two superstores, set fire to a newspaper office and paralysed France’s second-largest city’s subway system with a firebomb.

FRENCH President Jacques Chirac declared a state of emergency yesterday, paving the way for curfews to be imposed on riot-hit cities and towns.

RAMPAGING youths shot at police and firefighters yesterday after burning car dealerships and public buses and hurling rocks at commuter trains, as eight days of riots over poor conditions in Paris-area housing projects spread to 20 towns.

French prime minister Dominique de Villepin today cautioned against panic over bird flu before presiding over a meeting of key ministers on the potentially devastating virus.

After a year of mounting criticism, Secretary-General Kofi Annan defended the United Nations yesterday and urged global leaders to restore the organisation’s credibility by adopting broad reforms needed for the world to act together to tackle poverty, terrorism and conflict.

FRENCH Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin said yesterday he will judge Tony Blair on his actions, not his words, as Britain takes over the EU presidency.

French Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin presented a bill yesterday that would bypass parliament and urgently push through the government’s new jobs plan, a move that enraged the opposition.

France’s lower house of parliament plans a debate today on the future of the European Union and the EU constitution, two weeks after French voters shook the 25-member bloc by rejecting the charter.

Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin today told politicians his mission was to get a suffering and angry France back on its feet.

Immigration, as well as unemployment, are at the top of the agenda of France’s new government, which has the task of pulling the nation out of a crisis of confidence.

Newly named French Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin kept up the task today of trying to form a new government, while a poll suggested the former diplomat with an aristocratic bearing just might have a chance with the people.

France’s new Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin worked today to form a government and tackle the nation’s top priority – unemployment. But he already faced labour unrest on his first day on the job.

President Jacques Chirac today appointed Dominique de Villepin, a loyalist who was France’s voice against the Iraq war, as prime minister, to head a new government in response to a humiliating referendum defeat.

French President Jacques Chirac has appointed interior minister Dominique de Villepin as the country's new prime minister, after he accepted the resignation of Jean-Pierre Raffarin.

FRENCH President Jacques Chirac is seeking to recover momentum by reshuffling his cabinet after the humiliating rejection of the EU constitution.

EUROPEAN Union leaders clashed yesterday over a plan to set up camps in North Africa to process immigrants and asylum seekers to help stop the flow of illegal migrants crossing the Mediterranean to Europe.

EU leaders clashed today over a plan to set up camps in North Africa to process immigrants and asylum seekers to help stop the flow of illegal migrants crossing the Mediterranean to Europe.

France’s government today scrambled to map out its response to the kidnapping of two French journalists in Iraq, but showed no immediate signs of being ready to surrender to the hostage-takers’ reported demands.

A gay couple said “I do” today for the first time in France, days after the prime minister said such a union would be legally “null and void.”

French President Jacques Chirac vowed to press on with unpopular reforms that led to a stinging electoral defeat for his fellow conservatives, but moderated his tone and said that he had heard the message from disgruntled voters.

Foreign minister Dominique de Villepin, a relentless critic of the US war in Iraq, will head the Interior Ministry under a major French government shake-up.

The world is a more dangerous place because of the US-led war in Iraq, which may have toppled Saddam Hussein but also unleashed postwar violence and an increase in terrorism, the French foreign minister said today.

France today called for an urgent meeting of European Union foreign ministers, saying it was crucial for the EU to react to the attacks against Madrid with vigilance and unity.

Rebels who have launched a bloody uprising took control of another town today, closing in on the capital as Haitian President Jean-Bertrand Aristide appealed for foreign peacekeepers and the country lurched toward chaos.

Foreigners, some guarded by US Marines, were fleeing Haiti in droves today, as looting erupted in the capital and pressure grew for an international intervention and for President Jean-Bertrand Aristide to step down.

The French Foreign Minister, Dominique de Villepin, is in Dublin today for a head-to-head meeting with the Taoiseach.

Sobbing and holding each other up, relatives of the 148 people killed in the Egyptian charter jet crash mourned their loved ones today in an open-air tent facing the waters of the Red Sea where the plane went down.

Two top French ministers publicly disagreed today on whether Paris had prior knowledge of secret British and American diplomacy that prompted Libya’s pledge to renounce weapons of mass destruction.

US special envoy James Baker arrived in Paris today, kicking off a European mission to win support for Iraq’s reconstruction from some of the staunchest opponents to the US-led Iraq war.

With a weekend deadline looming, European foreign ministers made little progress today in resolving major differences on a first-ever EU constitution between countries seeking greater integration and those who fear a superstate.