Spectre of vampire rises

The election victory of Jean-Marie Le Pen is like the awakening of a vampire.

Who could have imagined that there was still political life in the 73-year-old whose blood-curdling credo seemed to be all but dead and buried? Anyone watching the rise of anti-immigration sentiment across Europe, that's who.

Raising the spectre of a France overrun by foreigners had long been Le Pen's political touchstone. After shaky beginnings when in 1974 in the first of four bids for the presidency he polled just 0.74 per cent of the vote, he began to be recognised by many as a reckless rabble rouser, a populist who plumbed the meanest depths of human anxieties, and by others as an inspired and brave leader.

In the 1980's, the latter group gained ground and Le Pen developed his thesis that reflected many of the ethics of the hated Vichy government of the war years.

He was the object of endless ridicule, not least for his habit of dyeing his hair blond to give himself an Aryan look. His former wife Jany, who had her own score to settle with him, took revenge in a way that delighted France - she posed for Playboy, kneeling provocatively in nothing more than a maid's apron.

It was a message that said Le Pen believed a woman's place was in the kitchen or the bedroom, something that apparently lies at the core of his beliefs. He echoes often the Nazi-Vichy slogan: "Work, Family, Fatherland."

The workers of southern France, who believe immigration from North Africa has compromised other opportunities and rights, were prepared to give him a hearing. Many liked his bruiser style.

Le Pen was born in 1928 in the Brittany town of La Trinitesur-Mer. He joined the Foreign Legion in 1954, seeing fierce action in Algeria and Vietnam, or Indochina as it was known.

His tours of duty in France's colonial outposts - especially Algeria, where he faced a bitter campaign against guerrilla freedom fighters - sharpened an already fierce sense of patriotism in Le Pen.

As the Algerian war of independence intensified and French troops were accused of systematic torture and murder, Le Pen and other leading veterans polemicised sharply in Le Figaro against the "slandering of the French army". He entered party politics in 1956, when he became a deputy for the shop-keepers' party of Pierre Poujade. In 1965 he helped run the election campaign of far-Right candidate Jean-Louis Tixier-Vignancour, and in 1972 he set up the National Front (FN).

With his dire warnings of the threat to French life from North African immigration, he pushed his share of the presidential vote up to 14 per cent in 1988 and 15 per cent in 1995.

In 1987 he created a storm when he described the Holocaust as "a detail" of history. Five years ago he fell foul of the law for an election punch-up with a socialist rival which almost cost him his seat in the European parliament.

In March 1993, he was arrested in Belgium for having guns and teargas grenades in his car. He said all the weapons belonged to his security personnel and was not charged.