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Charlie Hebdo shooting: Far-right Front National leader Marine Le Pen 'wants to offer France referendum on the death penalty'

Le Pen spoke a day after the Charlie Hebdo offices were attacked by gunmen

Thursday 08 January 2015 16:33 GMT

France's far right National Front leader Marine Le Pen, speaks to the media outside the party headquarters in Nanterre, west of Paris (AP)

The leader of France’s far-right Front National party Marine Le Pen has said she wants to offer the country a referendum on the death penalty, a day after the Charlie Hebdo offices were attacked.

Ms Le Pen told France2: “I want to offer France a referendum on the death penalty. Personally, I feel that this possibility should exist.

“I always said that I would offer French citizens the possibility to express themselves on the topic through a referendum.”

The death penalty was abolished in France in 1981.

The controversial leader claimed radical Islam was behind the attacks and said “denial and hypocrisy” are no longer an option, according to ITV.

“The absolute refusal of Islamic fundamentalism must be proclaimed high and loud by whomever. Life and liberty are among the most precious values.”

In pictures: Extremists in the EU

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1/6In pictures: Extremists in the EU

In pictures: Extremists in the EU

France: Marine le Pen

Marine Le Pen, 45, took over the Front National (FN), the party that her father founded, in 2011. He himself described her as “a big, healthy, blonde girl, an ideal physical specimen." She claims to have cleaned up the FN and succeeded in pushing her anti-European, anti-euro and anti-immigration agenda into the EU political mainstream

AFP

In pictures: Extremists in the EU

Germany: Udo Voigt

He will be the first German neo-Nazi to enter the European Parliament. The former army officer, born in 1952, was jailed in 1995 for inciting racial hatred. Formerly the leader of the far right National Democratic Party (NPD), Voigt was convicted in 2009 after he was caught handing out flyers at the World Cup which argued that a black player was not entitled to play for Germany, whose national team – the literature argued – should be made up only of white players.

AFP

In pictures: Extremists in the EU

Denmark: Morten Messerschmidt

Leader of the Danish People’s Party, which won 27 per cent of the vote. His party has rammed 20 laws relating to immigrants and asylum-seekers through the Danish parliament, giving it the most anti-foreigner legislation in Europe. His party calls Islam “a fascist ideology” and rails against “East European criminal gangs”. One party strategist said “blood ties” to Denmark should be required for citizenship, though the statement was quickly retracted.

EPA

In pictures: Extremists in the EU

Hungary: Krisztina Morvai

A senior member of Jobbik, the anti-Semitic and anti-Roma party on Hungary’s far right wing. In 2009, she attracted international publicity after declaring: “So-called proud Hungarian Jews should go back to playing with their little circumcised dicks.” In 2009, she cancelled an interview with a British newspaper, declaring in tones of outrage: “I am a decent politician and the mother of three children, yet you in the west keep portraying me as a Nazi and a Fascist.”

AP

In pictures: Extremists in the EU

Italy: Mario Borghezio

MEP for Italy’s notoriously racist Northern League, he has relentlessly attacked the nation’s first black cabinet minister, Cecile Kyenge, minister for integration, claiming she would import ‘tribal traditions’ into the Italian government. Other elected members in the party called her “an orang-utan” and suggested that someone should rape her, so she would understand how the victims of Somali rapists felt. He attracted attention by lobbying for the creation of an EU archive of UFO sightings.

Getty

In pictures: Extremists in the EU

Greece: Eleftherios Synadinos

Fabulously mustachioed retired lieutenant-general in the Greek army, he was one of Golden Dawn’s top candidates in the European elections, at which the overtly neo-Nazi party obtained more than 9 per cent of the vote. With its black-shirted assault squads, the Hitler photos and the party’s swastika-inspired logo, it has been accused of being a criminal organisation. Its website declares: “We aren’t the quiet birds of peace time, we are birds of the storm and the hurricane.”

Ms Le-Pen’s Front National party harnessed anti-immigration and anti-EU sentiment in France to win control of 11 towns and more than 1,400 municipal seats nationwide in the local elections in April.

Tensions are now growing in France as police continue to hunt for two men in connection with the brutal attack. Twelve people were killed by gunmen who stormed the Paris headquarters of the satirical magazine.

Some fear Wednesday's attack could be used to feed anti-Islamic agitation after it was reported the gunmen shouted "Allahu akbar" before embarking on the massacre.

On Thursday, a makeshift explosive device was detonated outside a kebab restaurant close to a mosque in eastern France, although police have not drawn a direct link with the Charlie Hebdo attack.

Two shots were fired at a Muslim prayer hall at Port la Nouvells in Aude in southern France.

After a series of Islamaphobic posts on Twitter, #BlameTheMuslimGame began trending mocking the users responsible for those tweets.