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French press review 31 December 2014

Population, hangovers, political party names and the euro - all in today's papers ...

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France is doing better than Germany - but not when it comes to the economy or unemployment.

According to this morning's L'Humanité, there are now more than 65 million French people. The precise number is exatcly 65.241.241.

This means France is still behind Germany in terms of population numbers - but with an average rise of 0,5% between 2010 and 2014. France is doing better than the European Union (0,2%) and much better than Germany, where the number of people fell by 0.5%.

These numbers are from the French National Statistics Institute.

Apparently the population is only growing in the costal regions and more and more people are choosing to live in cities.

It’s New Year’s Eve tonight and as a result, some people might have a bit hangover tomorrow morning.

But they should not feel bad, explains Le Figaro.

According to a study conducted by a group of researchers at the University of Nashville, a bad hangover might be hereditary.

One of the researchers explains that "our genes have at least in part, a role in how we digest alcohol".

But don't go blaming your parents if you feel sick tomorrow morning.

Our genes are only responsible for half of our capacity to handle alcohol.

Your stomach ache and throbbing headache might just be due to stress, smoking or lack of sleep.

The French Huffington Post says that Nicolas Sarkozy should think twice before changing the name of his party.

Former French President Nicolas Sarkozy promised to change the name of the UMP, France's main opposition party, when he was elected its president last month.

Right now, the UMP stands for Union pour un Mouvement Populaire - Union for a popular movement.

According to the website, Sarkozy is tempted to change it to Le Rassemblement - the gathering.

But for the Huffington Post, that might not be such a good idea.

Firstly because some members are dead against a change of name.

Former Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin recently tweeted he had always "favoured union against gathering."

But the biggest issue the HuffPost has is that the word "gathering" is the one most used by the opposition for the name of its successive parties.

That's 8 times since 1947.

"In choosing this, Nicolas Sarkozy would have a hard time making people believe there is anything new" explains the website.

There's one question left unanswered though.

Why does the French right changing its name so often?

On the left, the Socialist Party has kept the same name since 1969.

Finally, Lithuania is becoming the 18th European country to transition to the Euro.

Libération outlines some of the good reasons to adopt the European common currency.

The first one is that the euro is much stronger than the dollar, and that's a very good thing for imports.

For a small country like Lithuania, the euro is also good because it helps in exports and imports to other European countries.

Adopting the euro also allows Lithuania to distance itself from Russian influence.

But Libé wouldn't be Libé without a bit of criticism. So the newspaper also outlines why a country might want to steer clear of the euro.

Not losing control over your own money and avoiding being forced into austerity measures, like Greece or Spain, are among the reasons Libé gives.

 

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