Marine Le Pen says sanctions on Russia are not working

“aren’t working”, declared Marine Le Pen (pictured) on October 4th; “moreover, they are sanctions on the French.” If winter is difficult, said the leader of France’s populist-nationalist National Rally (), it will “be the responsibility of those who took these decisions”. As European resolve is tested by soaring inflation and energy prices, such arguments are worrying. They also bring fresh scrutiny of the ’s attitude—and links—to Russia.Ms Le Pen condemned Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, and called its massacre of civilians in in March “war crimes”. Yet when she this year, a flyer for Ms Le Pen was briefly in circulation which showed her posing with Vladimir Putin in Moscow, printed before he sent tanks into Ukraine. In 2014 the , then the National Front (), borrowed €9m ($9m) from the First Czech Russian Bank, based in Moscow, to finance its electoral campaigns. During a presidential debate in April Emmanuel Macron declared bluntly: “When you talk about Russia, you are talking about your banker.”