SARKOZY TO RUN FOR PRESIDENCY NEXT YEAR

PARIS France’s former conservative president Nicolas Sarkozy announced Monday he is running for the presidency again in next year’s elections, an awaited move that is expected to lead to a tough battle with rivals from his own camp.

In an extract of a book released on his Facebook page and Twitter account, Sarkozy wrote: “I’ve felt I had the force to wage this battle at a so tormented time of history.”

Sarkozy, 61, is expected to lead a campaign based on hard-line ideas on immigration and security in a country marked by recent attacks carried out by Islamist extremists.

The attacks have prompted a national debate about the place of Islam — France’s No. 2 religion — in a strictly secular society. With his strategy, Sarkozy hopes to grab some votes from the far-right National Front, whose leader Marine Le Pen has already announced her candidacy for the presidency.

In recent interviews, Sarkozy has said he wants to widen the 2004 ban on the Muslim head scarf in public schools to also include universities. In the name of secularism, he has also said he opposes pork-free options proposed by many school canteens for Muslim and Jewish children, and he has suggested that children born in France to parents staying illegally in the country shouldn’t be granted French nationality.