France's Le Pen condemns death threats against those trying her

By Gabriel Stargardter

PARIS (Reuters) -French far-right leader Marine Le Pen on Thursday said those behind death threats against a judge and prosecutors trying her in a graft trial should be punished, in her first comments on a police investigation into the abuse.

Reuters reported this week that police are investigating threats against a judge and two prosecutors in the trial, which could derail Le Pen's hopes of running in the 2027 presidential vote where polls have her as frontrunner.

Lead prosecutors Louise Neyton and Nicolas Barret have asked for a five-year ban from public office for Le Pen. Three judges, led by Benedicte de Perthuis, are due to give a verdict on March 31.

Le Pen said the threats, which came in now-deleted comments on two articles in far-right website Riposte Laique (Secular Response), should not be trivialized.

"This serious trend, which consists of threatening to kill anyone - police officers, judges, elected officials, artists, etc. - with whom some feel in disagreement, is a worrying development which, given its scale, must be the subject of reflection by the justice system," she wrote on X.

"Prosecutions must therefore be systematically initiated and the perpetrators convicted," added Le Pen, whose late-father's often-inflammatory rhetoric led to convictions for inciting racial hatred and condoning war crimes.

Gerald Darmanin, the justice minister, also weighed in - the highest-ranking government official to do so. "Support to magistrates facing unacceptable threats," he wrote on X.

Le Pen, her National Rally (RN) party and some two dozen party figures are accused of diverting funds intended for European Parliament staff. In a TV interview on Wednesday night, Le Pen reiterated she was innocent of the charges against her.

She said she could not imagine judges would deprive the French of choosing their presidential candidate and that barring her from office would be an attack on democracy.

The threats around the trial have raised concerns in France about growing risks of violence against figures of authority, including thousands of verbal and physical attacks against mayors, as well as a suspected attempt to ambush a prosecutor looking into organised crime that was foiled by police.

"This is not a specific feature of this trial but a more general and very worrying trend," Marie-Suzanne Le Queau, the attorney general of the Paris Court of Appeal, told France Inter radio on Wednesday. "All those who exercise authority ... are increasingly the target of death threats and completely uninhibited remarks."

(Reporting by Gabriel Stargardter; Editing by Andrew Cawthorne)