The China Mail - Petain tribute comments raise 'revisionist' storm in France

The row is the latest controversy over the legacy of Petain, a World War I hero disgraced for his collaboration with the Nazis.

Xavier Delarue, the government prefect of Meuse department in eastern France, said he would take action over remarks made following a mass for Petain organised by an association dedicated to restoring his reputation.

Interior Minister Laurent Nunez and a leading Jewish community group also condemned the comments.

The Association to Defend the Memory of Marshal Petain (ADMP) organised a mass Saturday at Saint-Jean-Baptiste church in Verdun, where Petain won a famous WWI battle in 1916.

Around 20 association members attended. Outside about 100 people, watched by police, gathered to protest the ceremony.

After the mass ADMP president Jacques Boncompain told journalists that Petain had been "the first resistant of France".

Boncompain also said Petain's post-war conviction for treason by a High Court of Justice had not been fair.

Protestors booed one member of the pro-Petain group as he sang a song in praise of Petain "Marshal, Here We Are".

The prefect, announcing the legal action, said the comments had been "clearly revisionist".

- 'Deeply hurt' -

Nunez, in a post on X, said: "The remarks made today on the sidelines of a mass in 'tribute' to Philippe Petain in Verdun go against our collective memory."

The minister condemned any attempt to rehabilitate someone linked to WWII collaboration and oppression.

Yonathan Arfi, president of CRIF, which represents Jewish institutions in France, called the tribute an insult to the memory of 76,000 Jews deported during Petain's time in power.

"Celebrating a mass for Petain is to glorify collaboration and rehabilitate a traitor to the nation," he added.

Revisionism, under French criminal law, is the act of negating or minimising crimes such as genocide, war crimes or crimes against humanity.

Anyone convicted faces up to a year in jail and a fine of up to 45,000 euros ($52,000).

The Petain tribute came soon after France's Armistice Day on November 11, the day WWI ended, when the nation remembers those who fought and died in the conflict.

Verdun's mayor, Samuel Hazard, had tried to ban the pro-Petain ceremony, but was overruled by a court on Friday.

"I'm deeply hurt, because I think of all the victims of Nazi barbarism and... Marshal Petain's ideology," he said after Saturday's ceremony.

Petain's admirers stress the role he played in World War I. He is widely seen as the architect of France's victory over German forces at Verdun, the longest battle of the war.

Petain died in 1951, six years into his life sentence in exile on the Atlantic island of Yeu.

S.Wilson--ThChM