The private funeral for the co-founder of the main French postwar far-right movement Jean-Marie Le Pen began Saturday amid heightened security after his death aged 96 exposed polarising attitudes toward a figure who for decades shook and shocked the country.
The funeral in his hometown of La Trinite-sur-Mer in the western Brittany region began in the presence of his daughter Marine Le Pen, who took over her polarising father’s political mantle, other family members and close friends.
Authorities beefed up security ahead of the ceremony, with barriers erected around the cemetery and dozens of police mobilised.
Security was tightened and protests banned after hundreds took to the streets in Paris and other cities to pop champagne corks and celebrate Le Pen’s death on Tuesday.
Marine Le Pen and one of her two sisters, Marie-Caroline, walked the few hundred metres between the family home and the small church of Saint-Joseph under blue skies in front of a small crowd of onlookers and several dozen journalists.
Neither Marion Marechal, Jean-Marie Le Pen’s granddaughter and a prominent far-right politician, nor Jordan Bardella, the leader of the party Le Pen co-founded, now called the National Rally, were seen entering the church through the main entrance.
Around 200 people were expected to be seated inside the church. After the ceremony Le Pen will be buried in the vault where his parents rest.
“It’s moving for me to pay my last respects to him here and to pray for the salvation of his soul,” said one of the guests, Bruno Gollnisch, Jean-Marie Le Pen’s one-time right-hand man.
“He was a joyful comrade!”
– ‘He loved France’ –
Some locals praised Le Pen’s devotion to France.
“I came to pay tribute to a man who served France and loved France,” one mourner said.
“We’ve come to pay tribute to a great man who had the courage to say things,” said another. “He was a visionary. He loved France and its people and they had values that are being lost, like love of the nation.”
On Friday, regional authorities issued an order banning demonstrations to avoid “the risk of disruption and counter-demonstrations likely to provoke clashes”.
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