"Jean-Marie Le Pen was hospitalized in a public institution in the Paris region. His family and loved ones are worried but serene," said his adviser Lorrain de Saint Affrique, reporting that Mr. Le Pen, a historical figure of the French far right, is "aware" and surrounded.

The 94-year-old former political leader has been hospitalized several times in recent years. In February 2022, Marine Le Pen's father was hospitalized following a mild form of stroke.

Jean-Marie Le Pen has been a candidate for the Elysée Palace five times, reaching the second round in 2002, only to be defeated by Jacques Chirac with an overwhelming score.

Born on June 20, 1928 in La Trinité-sur-Mer (Morbihan) and graduated in law, he was a legionnaire in Indochina (1953) and Algeria (1957).

Elected for the first time in 1956 to the National Assembly on a Poujadist list, he became the youngest of the Palais Bourbon at the age of 27.

Defeated in the legislative elections of 1962, he experienced a long crossing of the desert.

In 1972 he was appointed head of a new party that brought together neo-fascists: the National Front. And develops his favorite theme: "a million unemployed is a million immigrants too many", accusing the latter of taking advantage of social aid to the detriment of the French.

In 1984, he became a Member of the European Parliament, then in the legislative elections of 1986, won a seat in the National Assembly.

He was dismissed in April 2000 from the mandate of regional councillor of Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur, after his sentence to one year of ineligibility for violence against a socialist candidate in the legislative elections of 1997, one of his many legal troubles.

At the end of 1998, the departure of Bruno Mégret provoked the split of the FN, but despite the loss of part of his electorate, M. Le Pen succeeded in establishing the FN as the main far-right movement.

The "Menhir" has never confessed any regret for its excesses, controlled or not, repeated often, which earned it several convictions in court: from the gas chambers "point of detail of history", to the "inequality of races" (1996), through the German Occupation "not particularly inhuman" (2005).

In the Parliament in Strasbourg, where he has been elected several times, he says he will try "to defend the France against Europe, against the abuses of the European Union".

The youngest of his three daughters, Marine, inherited the party in 2011. She has long said "assume the entire inheritance", but she is finally exasperated by this father who has become embarrassing to "de-demonize" the party. Marine Le Pen finally expelled her father in 2015 after repeated polemical remarks about the Holocaust.

After the historic breakthrough of the RN in the legislative elections last June, with 89 seats, he had deplored "a certain media absence" of the RN deputies led by his daughter, calling on them to "react" by being "aggressive towards the power".

© 2023 AFP