French broadcaster back on air after ban for calling for Macron vote

A top French journalist suspended from broadcasting for calling for a vote for Emmanuel Macron to stop Marine Le Pen was back on air on Sunday but without the right to interview politicians.

Audrey Pulvar Public domain/Georges Biard

Audrey Pulvar, one of France's best-known broadcast journalists, was suspended by the CNews channel on 27 April after signing a petition entitled "Feminists, we don't want the National Front. We're voting for Emmanuel Macron".

The channel argued that she had violated journalistic ethics by saying which candidate she would vote for.

Pulvar stood by her decision, calling the National Front "a party that remains on the extreme right, racist and xenophobic".

She was surprised that so few other journalists had signed, she said.

Anti-racist group SOS-Racisme came to her defence, as did some politicians, including Families Minister Laurence Rossignol, who launched the petition.

Pulvar, who was born in the French overseas terrritory of Martinique and was at one time the partner of Socialist politician Arnaud Montebourg, announced on Sunday that she would be back on air for her regular broadcast 6.00pm broadcast.

The programme would discuss the news with philosophers and economists but not politicians, she said.

"When I signed this petition I know there would be consequences, not necessarily agreeable ones," she told Le Parisien newspaper.

CNews confirmed that her suspension was lifted but that she could not interview politicians to avoid accusations of bias.

But the ban will not last forever, it added.