The founder and long-time leader of the French far-right National Front (FN) movement, Jean-Marie Le Pen, was suspended on Monday night from the party for a series of extremist remarks in which he defied the softer line adopted by his daughter Marine, the party's current leader.
The FN Executive Committee also called a special party conference to abolish Le Pen's position as honorary president of the party. It condemned remarks by Le Pen in which he belittled the Holocaust and called the Nazi gas chambers a "detail in the history of World War II."
Before Monday’s meeting Marine Le Pen condemned her father’s behavior, saying he should “no longer be able to speak in the name of the National Front.”
The 86-year-old Jean-Marie Le Pen did not attend the meeting. Among other things, he recently defended the Vichy regime which collaborated with the Nazis during the war and its leader, Marshal Philippe Pétain, on whose watch thousands of Jews were deported to the German death camps.
Le Pen said it was below his “dignity” to be disciplined by the party he had founded and added that he would speak “only for myself” in the future. On Tuesday, he reacted to his suspension by saying it would be "scandalous" if his daughter were to be elected president of France and ordered her to "give up" the Le Pen name. He accused Marine Le Pen of "betrayal" and declared that his daughter was "a bit worse" than the mainstream parties "because an adversary fights you head on [whereas] here he is stabbing you in the back."
The Executive Committee's decision was opposed by supporters including Le Pen's granddaughter, Marion Maréchal Le Pen, and the party's former deputy leader, Bruno Gollnisch.
