French right-wing party split in father-daughter feud

PARIS, April 8 (UPI) -- Following inflammatory remarks by French far-right leader Jean-Marie Le Pen, his daughter Marine said Wednesday she would oppose his efforts in regional elections.

Together, the father, 86, and daughter, 46, lead the National Front (FN), which the elder Le Pen has turned into a protest group with a racist and Holocaust-denying platform; the daughter seeks to transform and modernize the party to better serve her plans to seek the French presidency in 2017.

The public break between the two came after the elder Le Pen was quoted in a recent interview suggesting French wartime Nazi collaborator Phillippe Petain was not a traitor, that post-World War II French governments treated Petain too harshly and that supporters of the Vichy government during the war, which cooperated with the Nazis when it controlled France, "have their place" in the National Front.

Marine Le Pen called those comments "a spiral between a scorched-earth strategy and political suicide," and said she would oppose her father's candidacy in regional elections. She also said she will organize a meeting of FN leaders to consider the party's future.

"A break-up was in the offing after years of tension over policy and style differences," said Luc Rouban of the Institute of Political Studies in Paris. "The FN is now at crossroads, killing the father breaks with a position of protest."

"The political split with Jean-Marie Le Pen is now complete and definite," FN Vice-President Florian Philippot commented. "Under Marine Le Pen's guidance, decisions will be taken swiftly."