French far-right politician Jean-Marie Le Pen dies at 96

French far-right politician Jean-Marie Le Pen dies at 96

French far-right politician Jean-Marie Le Pen has died aged 96.

Le Pen, who had been in a care facility for several weeks, died at midday on Tuesday "surrounded by his loved ones", the family said.

Le Pen - who repeatedly played down the Holocaust and was an unrepentant extremist on race, gender and immigration - founded the French far-right National Front party in 1972.

He reached the presidential election-run off against Jacques Chirac in 2002.

Le Pen's daughter, Marine, took over as party chief in 2011. She has since rebranded the party as National Rally, turning it into one of France's main political forces.

According to French media, she had just landed in Nairobi, Kenya when she heard the news and is flying back to France.

Jordan Bardella, who succeeded Marine Le Pen as party chair in 2022, said Jean-Marie had "always served France" and "defended its identity and sovereignty".

French President Emmanuel Macron described Le Pen as a "historic figure of the far right", adding that "history will judge" his role in the country's political life.

Far-right nationalist Eric Zemmour said on X that "beyond the controversies and the scandals" Le Pen would be remembered for being "among the first to alert France of the existential threats lurking".

On the other end of the political spectrum, Jean-Luc Mélenchon, leader of the radical left France Unbowed (LFI), said that respecting the dignity of the dead and the grief of their family "does not cancel out the right to judge their actions. Those of Jean-Marie Le Pen are unbearable.

"The struggle against the man is over. That against the hatred, racism, Islamophobia and antisemitism that he spread continues."

For several decades, Le Pen was France's most controversial political figure. His critics denounced him as a far-right bigot and the courts convicted him several times for his radical remarks.

In a notorious interview in 1987, he pointedly played down the Holocaust - Nazi Germany's murder of six million Jews. "I do not say that the gas chambers did not exist. I never personally saw them," he told an interviewer. "I have never particularly studied the issue, but I believe they are a point of detail in the history of World War Two."

France has strict laws against Holocaust denial and Le Pen was convicted of contesting crimes against humanity and fined €30,000 ($31,180; £24,875).

The former National Front chief was convicted of the same charge in 2012 after saying France's Nazi occupation had been "not particularly inhumane".

Still, Le Pen's strident anti-immigration policies attracted voters. In the 1988 presidential election, he took 14% of the vote. That figure rose to 15% in 1995, and in 2002 Le Pen reached the final round of the presidential election.

However, parties across the political spectrum called on their supporters to vote against him, and his opponent Chirac won with 82%.

In 2015, Le Pen was expelled from the National Rally after repeating his infamous Holocaust denial.

The dismissal also came during a public feud with his daughter, who accused him of reiterating Holocaust denial to try to "rescue himself from obscurity".

"Maybe by getting rid of me she wanted to make some kind of gesture to the establishment," Le Pen would later tell the BBC's Hugh Schofield.