Brussels / Paris, 25/04/2000 (Agence Europe) - The President of the Socialist Group in the European Parliament, Enrique Baron, welcomed the decree of French Prime Minister Lionel Jospin following which the leader of the French National Front, Jean-Marie Le Pen, has been stripped of his mandate as Euro-MP. "In the hemicycle of Strasbourg and Brussels, his presence was a permanent provocation to the values on which European construction is built: we were ashamed to be sat next to him. Good riddance!", says Mr. Baron in a press release.
Mr. Jospin's decree recalls that, in November 1998, Le Pen had been condemned to a sentence of ineligibility by the Appeals Court of Versailles, and notes that "Mr. Le Pen's ineligibility put an end to that mandate" (the leader of the National Front was reelected to the European Parliament in June 1999: Ed.).