Jean-Marie Le Pen, the founder of France’s National Front (FN) party, has died at the age of 96, French media said on Tuesday.

Le Pen rocked the French political establishment when he unexpectedly reached the presidential election run-off vote against Jacques Chirac in 2002.

He was succeeded as party chief by his daughter, Marine Le Pen, who has since run for the presidency three times and turned the party, now branded the National Rally, into one of the country’s main political forces.

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