French press review 03 May

Not surprisingly, all the French dailies agree today on the front page story.

Osama Bin Laden gets two-thirds of the front page of Le Figaro, in colour, along with a 10-page special supplement.

Libération's front page is a strange blur, probably a photo of Bin Laden, but it's hard to tell. Perhaps that's the subliminal message: so many questions surround his death and the disposal of his remains, is Libé suggesting that nothing is really clear?

"Bin Laden is dead, terrorism is not" warns the front page of Catholic La Croix.

The headline on the front page of Communist l'Humanité is a little difficult to interpret: "From the CIA to al-Qaida", either a summary of the information chain which led to the killing of the terrorist leader, or a reference to his former alliance with the United States when he was leader of armed resistance against the Soviet invaders of Afghanistan. L'Humanité regrets that he was killed rather than captured, since he has thus taken a huge stock of answers to impossible questions with him to his watery grave.

Popular Le Parisien devotes five pages to a description of Bin Laden's last hours, a description worthy of Hollywood's best screen-writers who, you can bet, are working on a cinema version of events even as we speak. Le Parisien also looks at reaction to the news on islamist websites. Predictably, there's a lot of hostility to the American action, alongside a certain amount of disbelief. Those who accept that Bin Laden is dead generally describe him as a holy war martyr, and there is harsh criticism of the joyous reaction of many Americans to the news. One internaut calls on Allah to send tornados and earthquakes to crush the godless.

Le Monde's front-page editorial is headlined "The second death of the founder of Al Qaida", the suggestion being that the current wave of rebellion in the Arab world has been a series of calls for increased democracy, nowhere have there been any serious attempts to establish more stringent islamic regimes. The rebels have been happy to call for western help. That, says Le Monde, proves that the Al Qaida leader had already lost the battle on home ground. But that does not mean that the terrorist menace has gone away. Fundamentalist terrorism may even, suggests Le Monde, become more dangerous, more difficult to counter, in the wake of Bin Laden.

Business daily Les Echos gives the top of its front page to the Bin Laden story, under the headline "Relief and vigilance". But that's not the day's main business story. That honour goes to the news that only 25 of the top forty French companies will have to pay their workers the controversial performance-related bonus this year. You'll remember that president Sarkozy recently thought it would be fair to oblige companies that pay huge dividends to their share-holders to also throw a few kopeks in the direction of the lowly workers who make such dividends possible. Les Echos has done the calculations, and no fewer than 15 top outfits, including the petrol monster Total and the national electricity company get off the hook, because their payouts, despite being generous, will show no increase over last year's level of generosity. So, under the new rules, no extra cash for the workers.

While Pope Benedict at the weekend was busily beatifing his Polish predecessor, John-Paul ll, he also found time to send an Australian bishop into early retirement. The bishop, William Morris, who has been looking after his faithful flock of sheep-farmers around Toowoomba, in Queensland, offended papal sensibilities by recommending that the doors of the priesthood should be opened to married men, and, this was the hard bit for the Pope, married women as well. The bishop made the suggestion simply because there are so few priests in rural Australia. And, now that he's been sacked, there's one fewer.