President Nicolas Sarkozy

In a chic Paris suburb, inside the luxury villa of France's richest woman, nobody much cared what the butler saw. When L'Oreal heiress Liliane Bettencourt met her advisors or lawyers to discuss secret Swiss bank accounts or lavish gifts to a male friend, the butler would simply bring in refreshments, then leave. But what the butler heard, thanks to a cheap tape recorder smuggled in with the bone china teacups and silver spoons, has proved an explosive twist to a high-profile battle for the Bettencourt billions.

PARIS - Just hours after 40,000 runners gathered at Place de la Concorde, the historic gateway to the French capital, for the start of the Paris Marathon, Nicolas Sarkozy was in the same spot for a rally marking the home stretch of a long reelection campaign. With supermodel wife Carla Bruni in the front row, the French president - and avid runner - clearly intended to show he was in fighting shape to win the race. Unfortunately, last weekend's event evoked an entirely different symbolism: Place de la Concorde is, after all, where King Louis XVI and his wife, Marie Antoinette, lost their heads to the guillotine.

Two members of French President Nicolas Sarkozy's government quit their jobs Sunday after a succession of scandals over lavish spending. Christian Blanc, secretary of state for the greater Paris area, who ran up a $15,000 Cuban cigar bill charged to taxpayers, and Alain Joyandet, secretary of state for overseas development, who hired a private jet at a cost of $143,000 for an official trip to the Caribbean, submitted their resignations Sunday...

French President Nicolas Sarkozy proved unable to be in two places at once and live up to his nickname "SuperSarko the Omnipresident," missing the birth of his daughter to fly to Germany for talks on the Eurozone crisis with German Chancellor Angela Merkel. But upon his return to France, he spoke Thursday of the "very profound joy" felt by him and his wife, Italian-born First Lady Carla Bruni-Sarkozy, who confirmed that the child had been named Giulia, the Italian form of Julia. "We have been lucky enough to find great happiness.

Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper on Tuesday rebuffed an American suggestion that he keep some of his country's troops in Afghanistan after a scheduled pullout next year, reasserting that only civilians would continue in the mission. Harper reiterated his stand during a 20-minute meeting in Ottawa with visiting Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton. Harper made it clear that "Canada will remain engaged, but this is going to be a civilian-based mission," said Dimitri Soudas, his press secretary.

After weeks of what the French press branded "false suspense," President Nicolas Sarkozy on Wednesday night finally announced what everyone expected: He will seek a second term in office. Sarkozy, 57, said it was unthinkable that he would not want to remain in his post given the "unprecedented crisis in France, Europe and the world. " "It would be like a captain saying at the height of a storm that he was giving up," he said on live television. The announcement came as Sarkozy's Socialist Party rival, Francois Hollande, has pulled farther ahead in opinion polls.

France's sometimes fractious Socialist Party, often seen as the likeliest party to unseat President Nicolas Sarkozy in 2012, emerged from its annual conference Sunday with no damaging public divisions yet with few shared answers on how to modernize its economic program to adapt to current fiscal conditions. Despite several recent victories, Sarkozy remains unpopular. Yet the Socialists suffer from an image as a divided clan, and the ongoing European debt crisis and France's growing deficit fears have only made the jobs harder, rendering many of the party's earlier proposals seemingly impossible to fund.

The leaders of France and Germany pledged to remake the rules of Europe, creating a closer economic union buttressed by strict rules on government spending and automatic sanctions against countries that break them. They now must persuade the rest of Europe to agree, and convince dubious financial markets that the steps are enough to regain control over a debt crisis that threatens to destroy the common euro currency. Compromising on their policy differences, French President Nicolas Sarkozy and German Chancellor Angela Merkel said at a joint news conference in Paris on Monday that the European Union — or at least the inner core of 17 countries that share the euro — requires greater budgetary discipline.

It was but a glance, a little smirk that the German and French leaders shared in public when asked about Italy's prime minister, Silvio Berlusconi, and his country's economic woes. But that moment at a recent crisis meeting made it very clear where Italy — and everyone else — stands in the Eurozone pecking order. Many Europeans realize that their futures are being increasingly dictated by Germany and France — in that order of importance — personified by a mashup of German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Nicolas Sarkozy dubbed "Merkozy.

The French news media have made much of the fact that President Obama is spending the "minimum" one-on-one time with French President Nicolas Sarkozy during his weekend visit to Paris and Normandy. "Can one stay in the capital of an allied country without saying hello to your neighbor?" the French daily Le Figaro said Saturday. (The Obama family is spending the weekend at the U.S.