Jacques Chirac: Former French president dies aged 86
“President Jacques Chirac is no more. His son-in-law Frederic Salat-Baroux said that Chirac died “peacefully, among his loved ones”.
Chirac served two terms as president and twice as PM, and took France into the single European currency.
French President Emmanuel Macron hailed Chirac as a “great Frenchman”.
The French National Assembly observed a minute’s silence in his memory.
Despite the corruption charges he faced after leaving office, he would be remembered for:
winning domestic and international plaudits for his fierce opposition to French involvement in the Iraq War, presciently warning it would prove a “nightmare”.
In 1995, Chirac became the first French leader to recognize the country’s role in the deportation of Jews to death camps during World War Two.
A number of world leaders such as Nicolas Sarkozy, François Hollande, Vladimir Putin,Boris Johnson have paid homage to Chirac.
