Marine Le Pen Calls Front National-Golden Dawn Alliance Talk a 'Smear'

Marine Le Pen, leader of France's far-right Front National party, has denied that she is "flirting" with Golden Dawn, the highly controversial far-right Greek party.

The day before the results of the European elections on 25 May, Le Pen's office issued a statement in reaction to a report by Euractiv, a Brussels-based online news and debate site.

The statement denied the report of a post-election alliance between her party and neo-Nazi Golden Dawn as "false and defamatory" and said that any agreement with Golden Dawn has been "excluded".

Instead, Le Pen has forged an election alliance with the right-wing, anti-EU Dutch Freedom Party of Geert Wilders, an alliance which apparently damaged Wilders' party when the Dutch went to the polls on Thursday. But any affiliation between Front National and Golden Dawn would be unpopular with French voters.

More, it is unlikely Le Pen would want to be seen to support any Greek party after the Front National's repeated attacks on billions in eurozone bailout money, much of it at the expense of French taxpayers, being poured into Greece following its economic collapse.

Earlier this week Euractiv claimed that although the Front National's official position was to distance itself from Golden Dawn, unofficially "Le Pen's Front National has expectations to cooperate with the Greek neo-Nazi party after the EU elections."

The report quotes articles in the Greek press which claim that if Golden Dawn are successful in this week's European elections, "Le Pen is mulling sending a congratulation letter [to Golden Dawn], a fact that will result in advancing a flirt that has already started between the French far-right and Greek Golden Dawn."

However, the statement from Le Pen's office said: "The remarks made by this representative are his opinion alone. We deny having any link with the Greek Golden Dawn. Any agreement with this movement is excluded. This article is false and defamatory."

Golden Dawn denies it is an extremist, neo-Nazi or fascist party. It has 18 MPs in the Greek parliament of 300 members, and while it has no members of the European Parliament, it does have several candidates standing in the European elections on Sunday.