National scene
September was marked by the “summer universtities” of the two main French far-right parties. First, Reconquête, Eric Zemmour’s party, held a weekend gathering between September 8-11th, aimed at fostering member’s involvement and cohesion through convivial activities, workshops and talks from executives from the party. On a similar model, Rassemblement National held its summer university version the following weekend. Marine Le Pen specifically aimed at providing training for the newly elected 89MPs and made it clear that the next aim is the victory at the next 2027 elections. To that end, the party wants to invest into institutionalising political training for executives. Immigration and energy prices were predominating themes.
Unsurprisingly, both the parliamentary and extra-parliamentary far right have praised and congratulated the respective successes of the far-right parties at the latest elections in Sweden and Italy, hoping to be able to ride this far-right waves themselves.
Transnational connections
Les Braves, the white communautarist white supremacist network created by Daniel Conversano has opened a new section in Estonia, as part of its aim to build connected groups throughout Europe.
Polemia, Jean-Yves Le Gallou’s foundation for “re-information” published this month an interview of the German AfD candidate Stefan Marzischewski-Drewes, running for the upcoming regional elections early October in lower Saxony.
In the meantime, the writings of Alain de Benoist, prominent figure of the French New Right (Nouvelle Droite), keeps being translated into Italian (see picture), and was invited for a discussion in Catania on September 30th at the museum Ursino Castle (see picture).
Another transnational connection is to be observed in the importation to France from the USA of “Active clubs”. Closely connected to Rob Rundo, a US American white supremacist and co-founder of the Rise Above Movement (RAM), a violent MMA group with members convicted after the Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville in 2017, and currently in Serbia. He runs the Telegram channel Activism, Athletics, Identity – a good summary of his interests –, but also an online clothing and accessories store with the brand “Will to rise”. In his legacy, Active Clubs have emerged in France since April 2022, claiming to be present in Rouen, Grenoble, Paris, Nimes, Chalon-sur-Saone, La Rochelle, Caen, Valence, Marseille; with pictures shared on Rundo’s channels. The main activities revolve around fighting and training, which is already a transversal occupation for many locally implemented far-right groups. For example, the Active Club Valence is connected to the existing group Valence Patriote (see picture), itself a support of Eric Zemmour during the last presidential elections.

National scene
Summertime is always an occasion for far-right groups to gather their members for a summer camp or “university”. Academia Christiana, the fascist identitarian-catholic youth organisation, held its yearly summer gathering on August 22nd-27th. They claim that 250 participants attended the event. The days were structured around conferences, sports, artistic and journalistic activities and community building around the themes or identity and sacredness, aimed at giving an impulse to local activism. Among the lecturers, the identitarian Julien Langella, former RN personality and president of the youth section of the party between 2012-2014 Julien Rochedy (he is now invested in writing philosophical essays while promoting a conservative vision of masculinity), the lawyer used to giving presentations to far-right groupuscules Thibault Mercier and without surprise the Abbot Matthieu Raffray, very active in the movement. The camp took place in Précigné, Pays de la Loire. The last day was an open day attended by many local identitarian organisations from all over the country. Action Francaise, historical monarchist nationalist organisation also held the 70th edition of its yearly youth camp Maxime Real Del Sarte (CMRDS) between August 21st-28th, close to Roanne, Rhone-Alpes with similar activities and the same objectives: political and physical training. They revendicate 350 participants and had two parallel days of “summer university” dedicated to older activists. Among the lecturers, Bernard Lugan from the Insitut Iliade circles, just as Guillaume Travers who however lectured at the Academia Christiana one. Jeune Nation, Yvan Benedetti’s antisemetic organisation’s nationalist youth camp also took place, on July 11th-17th, with a similar program-motto “training, camaraderie, sports”. Last but not least the traditionalist catholic organisation Civitas held its 4th “summer university” named “Real Country”, with a reported number of 270 participants. It took place in Dieppe, Normandy, on August 13th-15th. The goal? Fight the “globalist oligarchy” and the “Great reset” of which the Covid-19 pandemic is a tool. Despite the limited outreach of such events, their impact should not be underestimated. They constitute key social cohesion gatherings, most often aimed at training the youth, meeting and exchange platforms aimed at stimulating engagement, new local groups as well as new projects in line with the broader goal of defending a white French/European identity and consequently oppose what would come in the way.
Transnational connections
On August 9th,the International Indigenous Peoples’ Day, several European far-right groups, some coordinated or some independently, reclaimed this celebration to denounce the supposed decline of white Europeans, considered as the “indigenous” people of Europe, and the only minority “denied the possibility of claiming an identity and preserving an ethnic and cultural homogeneity”. A white supremacy com-event joined at least by neo-fascist Auctorum Versailles from on the French side.
Moreover, neo-fascist Luminis Paris also took part in the action… from Serbia, as two of their members report to have visited Belgrade but also Novi Sad “key historical city against ottoman invasions”. The were welcome by “Serbian comrades” from the Zentropa community and claim to have learnt on Serbian issues as well as shared methods from training and action.
Daria Dugin’s death, daughter of Eurasia theorist Aleksandr Dugin, on August 20th triggered an rather unanimously wave of commemoration among the French far right. Despite the disagreements with her father, especially on the topic of Islam, she appears as a symbol of ultranationalist fervour and it is her political engagement that is praised. Moreover, she studied in Bordeaux in the early 2010’s and met Marion Maréchal ex-Le Pen during her time in France, and is reported to have supported the wider Le Pen family for electoral purposes.
In the meantime, Daniel Conversano’s Les Braves continues on promoting Patriotic Alternative’ events such as their summer camp. On a similar continuity, Institut Iliade pursues its European reachout by being presented to a Greek audience this time, on the nationalist Webtv Eleftheros Kosmos.

Electoral scene
On Jun 12th and 19th, legislative elections took place in France to elect the MPs to the National Parliament. To general surprise, even the one of Rassemblement National (RN) itself, RN candidates obtained 89 seats (out of 577). In 2017, the RN only obtained 8 seats, being therefore unable to form a group (15 MPs minimum). This unexpected success gives them more political and financial power while bringing about new and old RN faces into the political arena. This testifies to the continued normalisation and mainstreaming of the party, as Macron’s party, which ended up losing its majority in the parliament, had based their campaign on the narrative of fighting both extremes, equalising and instrumentalising the “threat” posed by the far right and the left-wing coalition finally set up for these elections. In the cases when the left-wing coalition was directly competing with the RN at the second round, Macron’s party was, therefore, reluctant to clearly call to hinder RN candidates’ victories. Moreover, one can higher the number of far-right MPs to 91 with Nicolas Dupont-Aignan (DLF) and Emmanuelle Ménart, supported by the RN, renewing their mandates. However, Reconquête!, Éric Zemmour’s party failed to obtain a single seat.
Extra-parliamentary scene
In early June, four neo-Nazis from Alsace were arrested and charged after a Police operation. An enormous number of weapons and ammunition. Holocaust denialist and antisemitic literature was found, and one of the suspects is reported to have close connections with the identitarian group La Meute from Québec, Canada.
On June 11th 2022, Institut Iliade continued its European “tour”, after their Spanish event in May. They gave a presentation talk in Florence, Italy, with the collaboration of their partner publishing house Passaggio al Bosco, which has in the past translated Institut Iliade’s publications. In late May, Italy had already seen the visit of both Luminis Paris, a neo-fascist groupuscule, to visit Casapound activists in Rome, and the one of the student union Cocarde Étudiante to protest in Torino against EU institutions together with their allies from Fuan Torino. In Spain, neo-fascist Tenesoun from Aix-en-Provence met with the activist of Bastion Frontal.
On another note, Polémia, the think-tank close to Institut Iliade through its founder Jean-Yves Le Gallou, missioned and published an interview of Joana Cotar, and AfD MP, mainly on the theme of immigration. La Hallebarde, advertised as a “satirical magazine” from the French-speaking part of Switzerland, organised its first conference with two French guests: Jean-Eude Gannat, form Alvarium together with Abbot Matthieu Raffray, close to Academia Christiana and more generally to the ultra-conservative traditional catholic scene. The theme of the evening was: “how to take action for our own people?” and took place on June 18th in Lausanne.

National developments
In the aftermath of the presidential elections, parliamentary elections will take place in June. Nicolas Dupont-Aignan (Debout la France) and Florian Philippot (Les Pratriotes), two Frexiters who have surfed the anti-vax wave, will maintain their alliance for the upcoming ballot, among other candidates who are bringing brown-tainted covid-conspiracies to the electoral arena (on the close overlap between conspiracists and the far right, see this detailed investigation from Extracteur). Unsurprisingly, Marine Le Pen’s Rassemblement National’s candidates are still not “de-evilised” nor “normalised” as planned; rather, they are still spreading hateful and racist messages, conspiracy theories and/or are known for violent behaviours and/or an Identitarian past. More of these profiles are to be found among Reconquête’s candidates, which have at least no intention to hide it. Marion Maréchal (ex-Le Pen), after joining Éric Zemmour’s ranks in early March this year and becoming an executive vice-president of the party, is now campaigning for the legislative elections, together with Stanislas Rigault, head of the youth branch of the party, in an area where she was elected as an MP in the past, and where Reconquête had reached higher scores than the national average at the first round of the presidential elections. Marion Maréchal has therefore announced that she will leave the direction of her graduate school ISSEP in Lyon, in order not to keep the “impartial” – a clear hoax as her successor, Thibaut Monnier, has a long personal and professional history of being connected to Front National and more recently with Zemmour.
In the extra-parliamentary scene, the far-right continues to be present and violent in the streets. Antifascist groups report several violent events for example 1st May demonstrations in several cities, or at a pro-migrant demonstration in Angers, or simply attacking a migrant-help organisation in Paris. On this note, Street Press has shown how the far right has violently tried to gain terrain at the universities through student organisations in the last years. May is also the yearly occasion to commemorate the death of a far-right activist Sébastien Deyzieu, who died in unclear circumstances after a heated unauthorised demonstration organised by far-right groups on May 7th 1994 to protest against the 50th anniversary of American troops landing in Normandy. He died from his injuries two days later, on May 9th, which led to the creation of a May 9th Committee, “C9M”. This commemoration is still symbolically organised by a few (newer) groups in Paris. May 8th sees another type of yearly commemoration, the one of Joan of Arc by traditionalist Catholics, such as Action Française or Civitas.
Transnational Political and Financial Cooperation
Meanwhile, in Budapest, which has become a hub for far-right gatherings, two conservative conferences took place. First the “CPAC Hungary 2022” on May 19-20. This Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) is an offspring of the American Conservative Union (ACU) and was co-organised by the Hungarian organisation Center for Fundamental Rights. It was advertised as the following: “the first occasion that this major American political franchise arrives on the Continent. The American Conservative Union has for some time been looking for ways to bring CPAC to Europe, and over recent years, the conviction grew that Hungary, as one of the engines of Conservative resistance to the woke revolution, was the natural place for it.” It testifies to a rising influence of American conservatism and its entry into the European conservative spheres, for which Viktor Orban’s Hungary is a symbol. The program of the two days was organised around these 8 themes: Western civilisation under attack; In God we trust; Culture wars in the media; The father is a man, the mother is a woman; Conservative revival; Homeland, Security; CPACs all around the world; United we stand, divided we fall. A variety of speakers from the Americas and several European countries participated, including Viktor Orban, Eduardo Bolsonaro, and Tucker Carlson… For France, Jordan Bardella, temporary president of Rassemblement National (RN) gave a speech, as well as Gregor Puppinck, director of the European Center for Law and Justice (ECLJ), an international Christian conservative non-governmental organisation founded in 1998 in Strasbourg by Jay Alan Sekulow and Thomas Patrick Monaghan. Jay Sekulow was one of Donald Trump’s lawyers and has been a central person in the American Center for Law and Justice (ACLJ), a Christian ultra-conservative organisation, from which the ECLJ was born. The ACLJ is reportedly a key organisation financing the European far right, and, as investigated by Le Monde, the ECLJ and its director Gregor Puppinck have strongly supported the anti-LGBT+ rights and pro-life movement Manif pour tous.
Gregor Puppinck makes the perfect transition to the second conservative event that took place on May 26-27, as he also participated as the director and representative of ECLJ: the Transatlantic summit IV, organised by the Political Network for Values, an “a transcontinental platform in favour of life, family and fundamental freedoms as a space of encounter and exchange of reflections and best practices.” Citizen Go is part of the sponsoring organisation. The conference focused on the themes of Life, Family and Freedom.
Transnational Activities & Group Interactions
Insitut iliade co-organised together with the think tank Cercle Aristote and the Spanish student organisation Revolutio, an event on the theme of Sovereignty and Reconquest, on the occasion of the commemoration of the battle of Covadonga in 722, a symbol of the Reconquista. The event took place on May 27th in Ovideo, Spain. The main speakers were Philippe Conrad (president of the Institute), Pierre Yves Rougeyron (Cercle Aristote) for the French side, and José Javier Esparza and Eduardo Arroyo for the Spanish side. In November 2021, José Javier Esparza and Philippe Conrad already jointly participated in a presentation of the Institut Iliade event in Madrid. Lastly on Institut Iliade, despite a supposedly intellectual presentable façade, they openly chose the French white supremacist Daniel Conversano living in Romania’s Youtube show “Vive l’Europe” for the presentation and promotion of the Institute.
Back to France. On May 6th, Auctorum Social, the neofascist catholic-identitarian organisation in Versailles, organised a conference with members of the Italian Blocco Studentesco, the neofascist “student block” born from Casa Pound in 2006. Some Italian activists were there to present the “history and objectives” of the organisation. More generally on Italy-France relationships, Mediapart published an article on the historical influence of the Italian far right on the French one.
On May 7th, Yvan Benedetti’s Jeune Nation and Les Nationalistes organised a one-day event “Forum of Nation and Europe – NATO – out of Europe” in Paris. The event was organised under the sponsorship of Alliance Fortress Europe and Alliance for Peace and Freedom (APF). Participants included representatives from Germany, Romania, Spain, Hungary, Bulgaria, Portugal, the UK, Greece, Italy and Belgium. This event takes place only a week after the Fortress Europe congress in Dortmund, Germany, on April 30 and May 1st, where they all demonstrated together.

National developments
On April 10th and 24th, the presidential elections took place. At the first round, the podium was held by E. Macron (27,85%), M. Le Pen (23,15%) closely followed by left-wing candidate J-L. Mélenchon (21,95%). Just like in 2017, the duo Macron – Le Pen was competing in the second round, leading to the renewed victory of E. Macron with 58,55% of the votes, with M. Le Pen reaching 41,45%, a higher score than in 2017 (66,10% and 33,90%), and roughly 2,5 million extra votes. Despite the obvious “victory” of Rassemblement National, sealing its position as a strong political force, it is interesting to notice the failure of Eric Zemmour to embody the gathering force he promised on the right, as his party Reconquête! only achieved 7,07% of the votes. In spite of this lower score than excepted given the overwhelming media attention his candidacy received, he ranks 4th at the first round, significantly ahead of traditional parties such as the right-wing Les Républicains (LR) (4,78%) and left-wing Parti Socialiste (PS) (1.75%). It is moreover important to note that, at the first round, the three far-right parties received 32,38% of the votes, compared to 26,92% in 2017 – a telling number despite a different political context and different candidates then.
Transnational developments
On April 2nd, the identitarian think tank, heir of the Nouvelle Droite, Institut Iliade held its yearly colloquium titled “Restoring the political: Identity, sovereignty and the sacred”. It featured speakers such as Alain de Benoist, Renaud Camus, Paul Marie Couteaux, Julien Rochedy and Michel Maffesoli, but also notably Martin Sellner, head figure of the identitarian movement in Austria. He was announced to be a representative of GegenUni, an online educational organisation connected to the New Right in Germany. He participated to the panel “Training the elites and the executives of the European and French rebirth”.
On April 20th, Thaïs d’Escufon, former head figure of the French branch of Generation Identity, went to give a lecture in Leuven in Belgium to the Flemish identitarian student group “NSV” (for Nationalist Student Association) (see pictures). She poses with the symbols of the organisation and claims that her talk contributes to the training of the European identitarian youth.
The French far right as also made appearances in the European press. For example, here is an article on the Institut Iliade, with an interview of Thibaut Gibelin, contributor to Éléments, the magazine of Alain de Benoist. Here is an article in English from The European Conservative where Victor Aubert from Academia Christiania is being interviewed by David Engels, a Belgian historian, also speaker to Institut Iliade’s colloquium and affiliated to the Instytut Zachodni in Poznan.
This month, Les Braves and Patriotic Alternative (UK) have renewed their collaboration by publishing an article presenting and praising Patriotic Alternative on Les Braves, after the reverse was done earlier this year. Les Braves also made publicity for Europa Invicta and its yearly online counter-Eurovision song contest, under the banner of “make Eurovision European again”.
The student union Cocarde Etudiante, in line with its announced partnership with two other student unions in Italy and Spain, has released the first article translate to French from Italian, aiming at presenting the situation in Italy to the French audience.
Continuing the “solidarity missions” to help Ukraine, far-right groups have organised another collect and trip to Lviv. The name remains “Mission Medyka” and has been joined by two new actors, on top of Helix (Dijon), Luminis (Paris) and Bordeaux Nationaliste: Amiens Nationaliste and Bayonne Nationaliste, (see picture). This echoes with other enterprises of showing support to Ukraine and Ukrainian refugees from far-right actors using the war for their narrative of the need to defend white European peoples against the invaders. In March, Generation Identity Denmark celebrated the collaboration of Europeans activists from France, Hungary, Germany and Denmark to bring supplies to Ukrainian refuges, (see picture). StreetPress has investigated how several French far-right groups have used “humanitarian” actions as a communication strategy since the start of the war.
Lastly, Ouest Casual shared a photo showing a pinned picture of Dominique Venner, French identitarian thinker and writer of the Nouvelle Droite, supposedly from the wall of a military base of the Azov regiment in Mariupol, Ukraine, (see picture).

Key developments
On March 6, Marion Maréchal (ex-Le Pen), niece of Marine Le Pen and grand daughter of Jean-Marie Le Pen has officially rallied Éric Zemmour and his campaign – and was therefore the star of his campaign event in Toulon that day. Despite a clear betrayal of her aunt, her closeness with the identitarian wing and her ambition to contribute to the project of “gathering the rights” (rather, gathering the far rights) has been known for years. In 2019, even though Marion Maréchal was officially retired from party-politics and occupied with the management of her graduate school in Lyon (ISSEP), she participated to the Convention of the Right, along with Éric Zemmour where topics of anti-Islam, anti-immigration and “great replacement” dominated the speeches.
Furthermore on the electoral front, Éric Zemmour’s popularity has dropped since the beginning of the Russian invasion in Ukraine, because of his historical Putin-friendly positions and statements. The polls clearly show that Marine Le Pen is benefitting from this situation, as she managed to swipe away her similar Putin-friendly history by focusing on purchasing power discussions, even more central since the beginning of the war in Ukraine. Nevertheless, on March 23, Éric Zemmour went one step further in his ambition of “immigration zero”: he announced that if elected he would create a “ministry of remigration” and expel 1 million foreigners over 5 years. Some days later, he gathered many trends of the far right at the Trocadéro, Paris when he held a campaign meeting. Lastly, Nicolas Dupont Aignan, third far-right candidate to the Presidential elections, has been rallied by Florian Philippot, who had however first unsuccessfully attempted to negotiate joining Zemmour’s ranks.
On March 22, Valeurs Actuelles, initially a right-wing conservative newspaper which today constitutes a favourite outlet for far-right journalists and topics, organised a political “debate” with over 3000 attendees plus a YouTube livestream audience. Difficult to speak about a “debate” when 5 out of the 6 invited speakers belong to the (far) right. Among the public, the far-right social media personalities Thaïs d’Escuffon and Baptiste Marchais were there to support their candidate, Éric Zemmour. This event was co-sponsored by the social media Gettr favoured by the far-right and close to the US conservatives, and Odea travelling agency, partner of SOS Chrétiens d’Orient (accused of being connected to war crimes in Syria).
The extra-parliamentary far right has specifically made the news this month as the Argentinian rugby player Federico Martín Aramburú was murdered in an open street in Paris on March 19. The primary suspects are two figures of the far right, known for their violence: Loïk Le Priol and Romain Bouvier. The events of the March 19 remain unclear at this point, however several newspapers have reported that the shootings happened as a result of Aramburú, and his friend Hegarty, standing up to denounce racist comments made by Le Priol and Bouvier. This scene first led to a fight at the bar where the scene took place. As Aramburú and Hegarty were leaving, they were caught by Le Priol and Bouvier, arriving by car, who shot at them. Both suspects are former members of the Groupe Union Défense (GUD), a far-right violence student organisation founded in 1968 and self-dissolved in 2017, becoming Bastion Social (itself dissolved by the French government in 2019). They were both already known by the justice mainly because of the extremely violent joint assault of a former GUD leader in 2015 – for which they were meant to be judged next June. Le Priol is also the founder of clothing brand proudly worn by far-right personalities in the past. He was arrested when he tried to cross the Hungarian-Ukrainian border on March 23, and claimed he was on his way to Ukraine to fight.
In the meantime, on March 30, the French government has dissolved the Antifascist group GALE (Groupe Antifasciste Lyon et environs), which constitutes the first dissolution of a “far-left” group since 1982 – a decision that GALE will contest. The reasons are surely political, but formally it is on the bases of incitement to violent actions and calls for hatred towards the police forces that the dissolution took place. This decision is unsurprisingly controversial, in a context of upcoming presidential elections while Lyon is known for being a stronghold for far-right activists and groups.
As the war in Ukraine has given more visibility to far-right “solidarity” projects, Antifascist collective in Angers has investigated the humanitarian enterprise of far-right groups in France, and especially of the NGO “Urgence Humanitaire”. The organisation was founded late January and is presumably gathering activists connected to Alvarium, a neofascist organisation in Angers dissolved by the government last year. The war in Ukraine gave an opportunity for Urgence Humanitaire to rise and organise a mission between Poland and Ukraine, with an associated website “refugies-ukraine.fr”, where it states their mission to help “Christian refugees” who belong to “the same European family”. Other groups continue to organise donations of goods and medicines to Poland or Ukraine, sometimes joining forces with each other (Lyon Populaire and Les Braves Lyon; Helix-Dijon, Bordeaux Nationalistes and Luminis-Paris).

Key developments
On the parliamentary scene, the race for the presidential elections (10th and 24th of April) continues, just as the fluctuations in the polls that go with it. Florian Philippot, leader of Les Patriotes and a front personality of the anti-covid pass movement is no longer a candidate. Nor is François Asselineau (Union Populaire Républicaine, UPR) who failed to collect the 500 support signatures needed to compete. During February, more Rassemblement National (RN) executives have left the party to join Éric Zemmour’s campaign, including Stéphane Ravier, the only Senator of the party, and Nicolas Bay, European MP, accused of communicating strategic information to the Zemmour campaign. Éric Zemmour furthermore happily reported to have spoken to a supportive Donald Trump on the phone on February 15th.
In the wake of the billionaire businessman Vincent Bolloré acquiring more and more media in the last decade, therefore endangering the plurality of opinions and consequently the democratic debate, this article from ACRIMED, the critical observatory of media, reports on the normalisation and “mainstreamisation” of far-right themes in the public debate. The latest example might be when the candidate of the right-wing party (Les Républicains, LR) Valérie Pécresse, openly spoke about the existence of a “Great Replacement” at her political meeting in Paris on February 13, referring to the conspiracy theory popularised by the French author Renaud Camus, denouncing an alleged ongoing replacement of the white European peoples by non-white extra-European populations.
On the extra-parliamentary scene, February 6th saw its yearly commemorations. This date is symbolic for the far right for two reasons. First, because of the events of February 6th 1934, when right-wing and far-right anti-parliamentarian groups demonstrated in Paris against the new government, which had just dismissed the Paris Police Commissioner, known to be far right friendly. The demonstrations escalated and a dozen of people died, mainly demonstrators, and this event is often thought of as an attempt from fascists to overthrow the Republic, in a context of Mussolini and Hitler already in power in neighbouring countries. Second, on February 6th, but in 1945 this time, Robert Brasillach, antisemitic writer and journalist, was executed because of his collaboration with the Nazi regime. Far-right groups continue to commemorate “their” deaths on that date, through demonstrations and gatherings on Brasillach’s grave.
On another note, the foundation Polémia, headed by Jean-Yves le Gallou, held its yearly (since 2010) parodic event on February 7th of “Bobard d’Or” (Golden lies awards) supposedly denouncing “fake news” by mainstream media and the occasion to gather the far-right bourgeoisie in a Parisian theatre to feed their narrative of the alleged corruptness and unreliability of mainstream media, while promoting the need for their task of “re-information”.
Ukraine-Russia conflict
The Russian invasion of Ukraine has shaken the Russia-friendly positions on the French far right. The Rassemblement National (RN) has historically supported closer relations with the Kremlin and high-executives of the party have regularly visited Russia and Marine Le Pen herself was officially welcomed by Vladimir Putin in 2017, before the presidential elections. The RN has moreover reportedly received loans from Russian oligarchs and banks both in 2014 and 2017 to finance the EU and presidential campaigns respectively. Journalist have highlighted the connection between the RN’s positive attitude towards the Russian annexing of Crimea in 2014, and the allowance of a loan a few months later – refuted by Marine Le Pen, who justified it by her inability to be granted a loan from French banks. Mediapart especially highlights the role of Konstantin Malofeev in the financing of the party, but this oligarch is also close to other far-right personalities in France and beyond, such as Philippe de Villiers.
Éric Zemmour has voiced a similar support to the Putin regime in the past, in line with a general fascination for the authoritarian and sovereignist leader among the far-right. Neither him nor Marine Le Pen believed in the accuracy of an imminent invasion, and, even more in the context of the 2022 presidential elections, were forced to operate a 180 degree turn on their positions from the first days of the attacks. Despite the strict condemnation of Russia’s war on Ukraine, the narrative remains one that portrays Putin as a victim of NATO’s expansion. As expressed by Éric Zemmour, Putin is the “only guilty one”, but not “the only responsible one”. Similarly, Paul Marie Couteaux, a former Front National (FN) executive and today in the closest circles of Éric Zemmour, affirmed that Putin was led to invade Ukraine by the humiliation caused by NATO, and that the war is primarily serving US interests.
Additionally, while Éric Zemmour strongly prefers to restrict Ukrainian immigration by supporting the direct neighbour countries, the RN is instrumentalising the crisis to give a more humanist image to the party: Louis Aliot, RN mayor of Perpignan, exemplifies the double standard discourse regarding refugees. He went to Lviv in person to welcomed refugees from Ukraine, and turned of course the event into a public relation campaign. Last August, the RN was rather busy with organising a petition against the welcoming of Afghan refugees.
On the extra-parliamentary far right, there is a dominant support to Ukraine among nationalist groups such as Luminis Paris, Bordeaux Nationalistes, Les Zouaves Paris, Les Braves, Lyon Populaire. They have organised collects of money and goods for Ukraine. However, the support is unsurprisingly channelled towards Ukrainian ultranationalist groups such as the Azov movement and regiment, known for its neo-Nazi ideology – an ongoing and underlying support since the start of the war in Dombass in 2014. The leader of Zouaves Paris, Marc de Cacqueray-Valmenier, had been to Ukraine in 2019 and met with Azov members. However, Streetpress had also reported in 2016 on the involvement of (at least) 23 French far-right activists who had joined the battleground on the pro-Russian separatist since 2014.
A group that stands out by its unequivocally pro-Russian position is Les Nationalistes and the rest of the bubble revolving around Yvan Benedetti. He has described Ukraine as “an artificial country”, supporting a re-organisation of the borders according to “historic realities”.
In short, despite various and contradictory positions at times, the war in Ukraine is instrumentalised to serve typical and historical far-right narratives, whether it is islamophobia targeting the Chechen troops sent by Putin, or antisemitism when portraying the war as yet another action of the Judaic world order/globalist elites trying to operate a “Great reset” to better fool and control people. Moreover, the admiration for the Ukrainian resistance also feeds hyper-masculinist and ultra-nationalist tropes of European territorial defence in front of an othered enemy. Additionally, the overwhelming support to welcome Ukrainians fleeing the war is of course to be celebrated. Yet is also shows a racist judging of who is “a good” refugee and who is not, as shown in the treatment of non-white people also fleeing the war in Ukraine, and more generally by the previous attitude to refugees fleeing the middle east or African countries, also at war.
Lastly, the support for support for Ukrainian troops and people has led to collaboration among far-right European groups. This is best exemplified by the Identitarians, who, at the initiative of Generation Identity Denmark, organised food and basic care products collection and brought it to Budapest, where they celebrated the cooperation from activists from France, Hungary, Germany and Denmark to help Ukrainian refugees who had arrived in the Hungarian capital.

Key developments
In January 2022, Eric Zemmour’s popularity seems to have lost its momentum and rather decreases, as he now ranks 4th according to the latest polls for the upcoming presidential elections in April this year. Nevertheless, this month has seen several personalities leaving their respective parties to join Zemmour’s ranks, including the second-highest executive of the right-wing party Les Républicains (LR) and three key Rassemblement National (RN) executives, one of them being Damien Rieu (Damien Lefèvre), RN member and figure of the French Identitarian movement. Marion Maréchal (ex-Le Pen) also quietly voiced her support for the Reconquête! candidate, despite her historical family connection with the RN. More defections are expected, what testifies, besides political opportunism, of Zemmour’s success to pull the political debate further to the right and comes to shake the “de-evilised” façade of the RN. It also shows a certain success of Reconquête!’s strategy to “unify the Rights”, around an educated bourgeois and masculine crowd who funds the movement, benefiting from the support from the identitarian scene.
Eric Zemmour was convicted this month for the third time for incitement to hate and violence based on one’s origins, as he described immigrating unaccompanied minors as “thieves”, “rapists” and “murderers” in 2020. He awaits another trial for contesting a crime against humanity as he claims that Pétain, who collaborated under German occupation during World war two, “saved Jews”.
On January 5, Les Zouaves, a violent activist group, reportedly involved in the assault of anti-racist activists at Zemmour’s first campaign meeting in December 2021, was dissolved by the French government for incitement to hate and violence and spread racist and neo-Nazi ideologies. This did not prevent its reported leader Marc de Cacqueray-Valmenier to participate in an anti-covid vaccination pass demonstration in Paris, which led to his incarceration as he was not allowed to attend such an event due to his conviction in a different legal case.
January 15 and 16 were indeed the theatre of several demonstrations with a strong far-right presence. Saturday 15, Florian Philippot (Les Patriotes) called for an anti-covid vaccination pass demonstration in Paris. Identitarians, nationalists and hooligan groups attended and even formed their own section in the demonstration. They named it “White block” and claimed on the Telegram channel Ouest Casual to have gathered 200 activists (see picture 1). During this demonstration, AFP journalists were assaulted and insulted. As we enter 2022 with new far-right violence, check out Rapports de Force’s updated 2021 map of far-right violence.
Later that day, the organisation Paris Fierté, close to the dissolved Génération Identitaire, organised its yearly torchlight procession to celebrate the protector of Paris, Saint Geneviève. This march was clearly organised by former Génération Identitaire members but seemingly tolerated by the authorities despite the dissolution of the organisation in March 2021. The next day, on Sunday 16, the yearly “March for Life” demonstration took place in Paris too, gathering traditional conservative anti-abortion activists, but also the more radical far-right fringe such as the nationalist and antisemitic Yvan Benedetti (see picture 2) or the organisation Civitas.
International links
Jordan Bardella, RN president during Marine Le Pen’s campaign, complimented the Portuguese André Ventura for rising to third place with its party Chega at the recent legislative elections. At this time, on January 29, Marine Le Pen attended a two-day summit in Madrid with her European counterparts to discuss further the terms of creating a broader far-right/populist alliance within the EU. This gathering, led by the party Vox, was a third of the kind, after being initiated in July 2021 and continued in Warsaw in early December. The goal is to reform the EU in order to reinforce national sovereignty and traditional conservative values.
The student union La Cocarde Étudiante, inaugurated an official alliance with two other European student unions: the Spanish Revolution, and the Italian FUAN-Azione Universitaria. The aim is to defend the European Universities and youth against a perceived left-wing cultural hegemony.

Key developments

On December 5th, Eric Zemmour held his first political meeting to kick off his campaign in Paris, in front of 13 000 participants, including politicians and identitarian figures officially displaying their support to the new candidate. At the event, anti-racist activists were violently attacked as they conducted a peaceful action (i.e. shouting “no to racism!” wearing t-shirts with this slogan). Members of the ultra-right violent group Les Zouaves Paris counted among the assailants, and two of them have been arrested since then. Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin has reportedly started a dissolution procedure against the group. Eric Zemmour has not denounced the violent actions from his supporters.
On December 20th, a new violent video was revealed by an antifascist leader. The video shows Zemmour’s supporters practicing shooting. Their supposed targets: named left-wing members of Parliament, Emmanuel Macron, antifa, “leftists” and Muslim foreigners whom they insult with racist comments. Eric Zemmour made an official press release to distance himself from the video and its creators, in which he however simultaneously targeted the antifas allegedly “harassing” him. The two men shown in the video have been identified and will be judged early next year.
A new branch of the international Mototcycle Club (MC) Les Bandidos is reported to have settled in Besançon. Members directly come from the neo-Nazi scene and more precisely from the group Combat 18 (dissolved in 2019), which claimed to be the armed group of Blood and Honour, an international neo-Nazi organisation. The Bettoni brothers, former leaders of Combat 18 seem to be behind this new local branch.
 

International links

On December 3rd and 4th, Marine Le Pen went to Warsaw to meet her other leaders of European nationalist parties at the invitation of Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki (PiS). This was the follow-up of a meeting earlier this year which aimed to initiate a new alliance between a dozen of Conservative parties at the European Parliament. The hope is to bring together the Identity and Democracy, ID, (which includes the RN and la Salvini’s Ligua) and the European Conservative and Reformists group (PiS, Fratelli d’Italia) and the non-affiliated Hungarian Fidesz members, to create an greater nationalist and conservative political force at the EU Parliament.
On December 12th, Yvan Benedetti (Jeune Nation and Les Nationalistes), gave an online conference to the Portuguese nationalist movement Força Nova (see picture 1).
Les Braves, (Conversano) inaugurated two new national sections in Russia and Ukraine. (see pictures 2 and 3).

Key developments

• On November 2, StreetPress revealed that supporters of Eric Zemmour practiced shooting on racist caricature targets (a black man, a Muslim, a Jew).
• On November 5, as a response to StreetPress’ article, a far-right Telegram channel published a photomontage with pictures or caricatures of left-wing journalists and politicians (among others), with a red target on their forehead. Alongside the message provides a link to a website where one can legally buy weapons. Claims have been filed to the police.
• Between November 4-7, a catholic-fundamentalist training camp for young men between 16 and 23 years old was held near Orléans. The “Camps des Hussards” was led by Abbot Matthieu Raffray, a figure of the far-right catholic-fundamentalist sphere. On the program for the weekend, only manly activities: “fight, fight, pray”. Baptiste Marchais, a far-right youtuber was also present.
• On November 17, the local organisation Alvarium in Angers was dissolved by the French government, on the basis of inciting to discrimination and violence, notably through the promotion of an amalgam between immigration, Islam and terrorism, spreading a xenophobic ideology through connections with other similar groups.
• On November 23, 13 far-right activists were arrested as they planned violent actions. They were part of a wider network called “Recolonisation France” and which had a least 4 regional entities. This group promotes an identitarian, racist and survivalist ideology, and had already gathered many weapons and called for the formation or armed action groups. Telegram was used as a means to recruit new members, as well as personalities of the far right such as “Monsieur K”, close in the past to Alain Soral (Égalité et Réconciliation)
• On November 20, the Collectif Nemesis, a far-right “feminist” group (anti-Islam and immigration) was present at the feminist demonstration to protest against violence against women. As they tried to be silenced, trouble arose and their masculine defenders from La Cocarde Étudiante (student union) and Action Française got into a fight.
• On November 20, a customs investigation led the Police to inspect the residence of a person where they found over 130 weapons as well as neo-Nazi propaganda. An accomplice, an active soldier from the French army, was already been denounced by Mediapart’s investigation earlier this year for his public display of Nazi symbols.
• On November 27, the Foundation Polemia, founded notably by Jean-Yves Le Gallou, held its 7th Forum of dissidence, featuring the sociologist Michel Maffesoli and Nicolas Faure (Sunrise Media), among others. The theme was “You are the majority, they are the extremists!” (See picture 1).
• On November 30, Eric Zemmour finally announced he will run for the 2022 presidential elections, with a dramatic video combining a speech and images on the downfall of France.
   

  International links

• Between November 19-21, Yvan Benedetti organized and led a trip to “nationalist Spain” in order to celebrate the anniversary of the death of Jose Antonio Primo de Rivera on November 19th, founder of the Falange Española (see Pictures 2 and 3).
• Les Braves opened a new section in Croatia (See Picture 4) and were present in Warsaw, Poland on November 11 for the Nationalist march and celebration (see picture 5)

Key developments

• On October 2nd a 19-year-old was arrested as he had planned to commit terrorist attacks on two mosques and his former high school, on April 20, 2022, Hitler’s birthday. This article on Mediapart gives more context on the accelerationist doctrine behind such deadly projects (the aim being to trigger a racial civil war, thought as inevitable, therefore the need to accelerate its occurrence in order to start anew).
• Eric Zemmour, still not officially a candidate for the presidential elections, keeps rising in election polls and occupying media space to spread his hateful speeches. He also continues his book release tour, considered by many as a (not so well) disguised campaign. Mediapart revealed his connections and organizational support from well-known far-right groups such as the monarchist organization Action Française.
• Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin has started a procedure to dissolve the organization Alvarium in Angers, born in the wake of the Bastion Social (dissolved in 2019) and close to other organizations such as Génération Identitaire (dissolved in 2021).
• Far-right violence has increased in the last few months. This can be partly explained by the numerous weekly demonstrations against covid measures and the vaccine obligation/covid-pass, where the far-right has been very present. Here is the map of far-right violence.
• On October 28th Rémi Daillet, the figure of conspiracy movements connected to the Honneur et Nation neonazi group was now been charged for terrorism as he was involved with the coordination of a 300 people network (organized in local entities) eventually planning a coup. Its “operation Azul” counted vaccination centers, 5G towers, a masonic lodge, and journalists among its numerous targets.
   

  International links

• On September 25th, members of Jeune Nation (a group led by Yvan Benedetti) were in Sofia, Bulgaria to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the National Bulgarian Union. Recently they have shown their support against the banning of the organization.
• Marion Maréchal formalized yet another partnership between her graduate school ISSEP and, this time, the Collegium Intermarium in Warsaw, Poland. They indeed share “the same ambition to train a new generation of executives who serve and defend the European heritage and the freedom of Nations” (see Picture 1).
• Les Braves, Daniel Conversano’s organization started an English Telegram channel in order to attract a wider community. The organization is spreading across Europe, as shown by their map of local groups. It advertised in this logic its upcoming participation in the 11th November demonstration in Warsaw along with Polish Nationalists, to celebrate the anniversary of Poland’s independence (see Pictures 2 and 3).
• Thais d’Escufon, the former spokesperson of Génération Identitaire, was once again the guest on Martin Sellner (Generation Identity Austria)’s show to speak about Eric Zemmour, whom she supports.
• Jordan Bardella, RN president, was present at the launch of a new far-right party in Belgium: Chez Nous, along with Tom Van Grieken, the president of the Vlaams Belang (see Picture 4).
• On October 26ht Marine le Pen, RN and presidential candidate, met Viktor Orban in Hungary to reaffirm their ideological proximity against immigration, EU regulations, and for an alliance of Nations in Europe (see Picture 5)