François Duprat
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François Duprat (1941-1978) was French historian, educator, and revisionist writer. He was known also for being founder member and part of the leadership of the "far right" Front National party.
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[edit] Biography
He was born on October 26, 1941, in Ajaccio, Corsica, and was educated in Bayonne, Toulouse, and at the prestigious Lycée Louis-le-Grand in Paris. In 1963 he earned a diploma of higher studies in history.
[edit] Politics
A Trotskyist in his teenage years, he moved to the right and became a member of the "Jeune Nation" wing of the French nationalist students' federation (Fédération des étudiants nationalistes FEN), and Occident (after spending some time in Katanga as the Director of Propaganda for Moïse Tshombé on Radio-Katanga and from which he was excluded in 1967), d'Ordre nouveau. He was the Editor of 'L'Action européenne et la Revue d’histoire du fascisme. Although strongly opposed to Algerian independence during the Algerian War of Independence, Duprat was later pro-Arab and a confirmed anti-Semite.
He was member of the "far right" Front National party from when it was founded, and part of its leadership from 1972 until his death in 1978. He was regarded as a hard-liner, and directed Groupes nationalistes révolutionnaires, alongside Alain Renault.
His efforts to rehabilitate fascism were reflected in his writings. This included an attempt to rehabilitate Nazi war criminal Joachim Peiper, one of the Officers involved in the Malmedy massacre, referring to him as an "irreproachable and courageous soldier[1]".
[edit] Violent death
"Nazi hunters" Serge and Beate Klarsfeld, Patrice Chairoff had kept and published a "Neo-Nazi File" (1977), where the name and address of Duprat, and of other persons who were suspected of fascism, neo-Nazism, or revisionism (Le Monde, March 23, 1978, p. 7; April 26, 1978, p. 9) were revealed. Duprat was killed on March 18, 1978, in a car-bomb explosion. His wife Jeanine was also victim of the attack, and lost the use of her legs. A Jewish "Remembrance Commando" and a "Jewish Revolutionary Group" claimed responsibility for the murder, however, the perpetrators were never found.
[edit] References
- ^ Speech given to a meeting of neo-nazis in Cologne, 11 September 1976
[edit] Further reading
- Chebel d'Appollonia, A., L'Extrême Droite en France: De Maurras à Le Pen. Éditions Complexe, Brussels, 2nd edition, 1996. ISBN 2-87027-573-0
- Igounet, Valérie, Histoire du négationnisme en France. Éditions du Seuil, Paris, 2000. ISBN 2-02-035492-6
