As French paper ends strike, new editor to find 'empty newsroom'

By Michel Rose

PARIS (Reuters) - Journalists at France's flagship Sunday newspaper, Le Journal du Dimanche, agreed with owner Lagardere on Tuesday to end a five-week strike in protest against the nomination of a new editor-in-chef who had worked for a far-right magazine.

Staff had been on strike since late June to protest the nomination of Geoffroy Lejeune, the former head of magazine Valeurs Actuelles, which has courted controversy with anti-immigrant covers and was fined for racist insult in 2022.

His nomination had raised concerns in France about the expansion of an increasingly strident right-wing media empire under the control of French billionaire Vincent Bollore, which has drawn comparisons with U.S. TV channel, Fox News.

Press freedom groups and the French government have voiced reservations over Lejeune's appointment, with President Emmanuel Macron's culture minister, Rima Abdul Malak, saying she was alarmed by the risk to French "values."

Both Lagardere, which is being taken over by Bollore, and the journalists' association, confirmed a deal had been agreed to end the strike, which has prevented the newspaper from hitting the newsstands for six consecutive weekends.

However, journalists for the paper, a mainstay of the French media landscape renowned for its political coverage, said the deal to end the strike came as it became clear Lagardere would proceed to appoint Lejeune, adding that the move would prompt many reporters to leave.

"If we managed to throw the spotlight on the independence of newsrooms, we did not win against our shareholder," the journalists association said in a statement. "Today, Geoffroy Lejeune takes office. He will find an empty newsroom."

Lagardere said in a statement it welcomed the deal and that the newspaper would be back in newsstands from mid-August.

The strike at Le Journal du Dimanche (JDD) and the agreement over a severance package for reporters who have decided to leave follow a pattern at other media outlets acquired by Bollore over the past years.

The group now owns 24-hour news channel CNews, which was rebranded and most of its staff replaced after a long strike, and has taken a conservative turn since. Anti-immigration and hardline law-and-order comments made by some of its talk show hosts regularly inflame social media users.

(Additional reporting by Sudip Kar-Gupta and Layli Foroudi; Editing by Louise Heavens)