Roland Blum (born 12 July 1945 in Les Pennes-Mirabeau) is a French conservative politician and member of the

National Assembly of France The National Assembly (, ) is the lower house of the Bicameralism, bicameral French Parliament under the French Fifth Republic, Fifth Republic, the upper house being the Senate (France), Senate (). The National Assembly's legislators are known ...

. He belongs to the

Union for a Popular Movement The Union for a Popular Movement ( ; UMP ) was a Liberal conservatism, liberal-conservative List of political parties in France, political party in France, largely inspired by the Gaullism, Gaullist tradition. During its existence, the UMP was o ...

(UMP).

Life and career

A former student of the Institut d'études politiques d'Aix-en-Provence (science political school), he was elected deputy on 16 June 2002 in the

Bouches-du-Rhône Bouches-du-Rhône ( ; , ; ; "the Mouths of the Rhône") is a Departments of France, department in southern France. It borders Vaucluse to the north, Gard to the west and Var (department), Var to the east. The Mediterranean Sea lies to the sout ...

. He was the first French deputy to interpellate the government on the subject of

Muhammad al-Durrah On 30 September 2000, the second day of the Second Intifada, 12-year-old Muhammad al-Durrah () was killed at the Netzarim Junction in the Gaza Strip during widespread protests and riots across the Palestinian territories against Israeli ...

, a child killed in the Palestinian territories and filmed and commented by

Charles Enderlin Charles Enderlin (; born 1945) is a French-Israeli journalist, specialising in the Middle East and Israel. He is the author of a number of books on the subject, including ''Shamir, une biographie'' (1991), ''Shattered Dreams: The Failure of the P ...

France 2 France 2 () is a French free-to-air public television channel. The flagship channel of France Télévisions, it broadcasts generalist programming including news, entertainment (such as dramas, films, and game shows), factual programmes, and sp ...

TV, claiming it was a fake. The investigation has shown that such was not the case, and France 2 has deposed a complaint against X (equivalent to

John Doe John Doe (male) and Jane Doe (female) are multiple-use placeholder names that are used in the British, Canadian, and American legal systems, when the true name of a person is unknown or is being intentionally concealed. In the context of law ...

) on charges of

defamation Defamation is a communication that injures a third party's reputation and causes a legally redressable injury. The precise legal definition of defamation varies from country to country. It is not necessarily restricted to making assertions ...

. Following the request from Greens deputies

Noël Mamère Noël Mamère (; born 25 December 1948) is a French journalist and former politician. He was the mayor of Bègles in Gironde from 1989 to 2017, as well as deputy to the French National Assembly for Gironde's 3rd constituency from 1997 to 201 ...

, Martine Billard and Yves Cochet on September 10, 2003, for the constitution of a Parliamentary Commission on the "role of France in the support of military regimes in Latin America from 1973 to 1984" before the Foreign Affairs Commission of the National Assembly, presided by

Édouard Balladur Édouard Balladur (; born 2 May 1929) is a French politician who served as Prime Minister of France under François Mitterrand from 29 March 1993 to 17 May 1995. He unsuccessfully ran for president in the 1995 French presidential election, co ...

( UMP), a request made following the investigations carried on by journalist Marie-Monique Robin, Roland Blum was nominated as responsible of the Commission. However, he refused to hear Marie-Monique Robin, and published in December 2003 a 12 pages report qualified by Robin as the summum of bad faith. It claimed that no military cooperation agreement had been signed between France and Argentina, despite the agreement found by Robin in the ''

Quai d'Orsay The Quai d'Orsay ( , ) is a quay in the 7th arrondissement of Paris. It is part of the left bank of the Seine opposite the Place de la Concorde. It becomes the Quai Anatole-France east of the Palais Bourbon, and the Quai Branly west of the ...

'', which showed that French veterans of the

Algerian War The Algerian War (also known as the Algerian Revolution or the Algerian War of Independence) ''; '' (and sometimes in Algeria as the ''War of 1 November'') was an armed conflict between France and the Algerian National Liberation Front (Algeri ...

were in mission in Buenos Aires from 1959 to 1981.RAPPORT FAIT AU NOM DE LA COMMISSION DES AFFAIRES ÉTRANGÈRES SUR LA PROPOSITION DE RÉSOLUTION (n° 1060), tendant à la création d'une commission d'enquête sur le rôle de la France dans le soutien aux régimes militaires d'Amérique latine entre 1973 et 1984, PAR M. ROLAND BLUM

French National Assembly The National Assembly (, ) is the lower house of the Bicameralism, bicameral French Parliament under the French Fifth Republic, Fifth Republic, the upper house being the Senate (France), Senate (). The National Assembly's legislators are known ...

Life and career

References

See also