TOKYO, January 27. /TASS/. France should have strategic relations with Russia instead of keeping them in the current state, which is close to a Cold War, Marine Le Pen, the leader of the National Front right-wing party has said in an interview published by the Osaka-based newspaper Asahi Shimbun.
She said she was bowing her head to Russia, which lived through a period of harsh trials after the collapse of the Soviet Union and attained restoration of the national economy.
Le Pen called Russia a great country that had build a model of a state differing from the US and this made it a worthy partner to build strategic relations with.
However, the EU could have only the Cold War-like type of relationship with Russia because it was strictly following US instructions, she said.
Le Pen aired highly critical notes on the EU, saying France was not getting any dividends from membership of the union, only debts, unemployment, the watering down of ethnic identity.
France had lost sovereignty in the spheres of finance, budget and legislation and it did not have the power to decide on its destiny independently, she said, adding that all the decisions were being made by a handful of bureaucrats contrary to people’s will and this was bringing poverty and despair to ordinary people.
At present, the National Front is one of the three leading political parties in France. It scored a notable success in the municipal elections in 2014 when it got a majority of seats in the mayors’ offices of twelve different cities.
In May 2014, the National Front achieved one more breakthrough and got the first place at elections to the European Parliament upon the results of nationwide voting.