ISTANBUL

French far-right politician Eric Zemmour’s convictions for hate speech and defamation became final Tuesday after the Court of Cassation rejected his latest appeals.

The country’s top court upheld rulings that found him guilty over remarks targeting unaccompanied migrant minors and comments made against a lawyer in a separate case.

It confirmed that Zemmour, the founder and current president of the Reconquete party, was “rightly” convicted for complicity in public insult and incitement to hatred over statements he made on the CNews channel in 2020, when he described unaccompanied migrant minors as “thieves,” “murderers” and “rapists.”

He was ordered to pay €10,000 ($11,637) in fines, Le Parisien reported.

The court said the comments “exceeded the permissible limits of freedom of expression due to their violence and generality,” adding that they could not be justified even in the context of ongoing debates on France’s immigration policy.

Under French press law, the editor-in-chief of CNews at the time, Jean-Christophe Thiery de Bercegol du Moulin, was convicted of the main offenses and fined €3,000.

CNews itself previously received a €200,000 fine imposed by the former audiovisual regulator CSA (now Arcom), a penalty later upheld by the Conseil d’Etat.

The European Court of Human Rights dismissed a challenge from the broadcaster in January 2025.

In April 2022, days before the presidential election, Zemmour told France 2 that the father of Jeremie Cohen, a young Jewish man who died after being struck by a tram following an assault, had said “his lawyer Patrick Klugman wanted absolutely to cover up the case.”

Prosecutors later found no evidence supporting any “religious motive” in Cohen’s death.

Courts convicted Zemmour of defamation both in the first instance and on appeal, issuing a €10,000 fine, now finalized.

Zemmour, known for his hardline anti-immigration rhetoric and repeated clashes with media regulators and courts, faces a growing list of judicial setbacks as he seeks to remain a prominent voice in the run-up to France’s 2027 presidential race.