Paris, (APP – UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News – 1st Apr, 2025) French far-right leader Marine Le Pen on Monday slammed a “political decision” after being convicted for embezzlement and banned from standing in an election for five years with immediate effect.
Le Pen said she would appeal the ruling, and vowed that in “no way” would she retire from political life, in a combative interview with the commercial French television network TF1.
A French court earlier Monday found her guilty of embezzlement of European parliament money and imposed the ban on running for public office.
She was also handed a four-year prison sentence, two years of which were suspended and the two would be served outside jail with an electronic bracelet.
“I’m not going to let myself be eliminated like this. I’m going to pursue whatever legal avenues I can. There is a small path.
It’s certainly narrow, but it exists,” she said, urging the judiciary to hold the appeal hearing swiftly so she could still take part in the 2027 vote.
She said that the appeal would be lodged “as quickly as possible” and said that the judiciary should “get a move on” so it is heard in time.
Describing herself as the “favourite” to win the 2027 presidential elections, Le Pen characterised the judge who delivered the verdict as saying: “‘I do not want Marine Le Pen elected’.”
“I am going to appeal because I am innocent,” Le Pen said.
“There are millions of French people who believe in me, millions of French people who trust me and I come to tell them that I have been fighting for you for 30 years and that I have been fighting against injustice for 30 years and consequently, I will continue to do so and I will do it until the end,” she said.
