France mourns its former president Jacques Chirac. A queue was formed in front of the Elysees Palace in Paris last night. Hundreds of people wanted to pay their respects to the former president in the illustrated condolence books, as the news broadcaster BFMTV reported. Until Sunday, the population there should have the opportunity to express their condolences. The conservative politician died yesterday at the age of 86 years.
„We’re losing a statesman we loved as much as he loved us,“ said French President Emmanuel Macron in a TV address. He praised Chirac as a great Frenchman. On Sunday afternoon there will be a big funeral service in the Invalides in Paris. As the family announced today, Chirac is then buried on Monday in a small circle on the Paris cemetery Montparnasse.
Chirac coined French politics over four decades. From 1995 to 2007, he pulled the strings in the Elysees Palace as a power-conscious head of state. Politicians from home and abroad appreciated the merits of the former president, who had long been Paris mayor.
