London, January 14 : Controversial French Justice Minister Rachida Dati has dismissed suggestions that her cabinet days are numbered, saying that she will keep her post this year.

She was reacting to reports that said that tipped her to step down, and represent President Nicolas Sarkozy''s Right-wing UMP party in June elections for the European parliament.

It was recently said that the minister was at loggerheads with magistrates, prison officials and lawyers, who thought that she was unable or unwilling to dialogue with them on reforms.

Paris - French consumer prices fell by 0.2 per cent in December compared to the previous month, owing largely to falling energy prices, the government's statistical office INSEE said on Wednesday.

Year on year, inflation stood at 1 per cent, INSEE said, after energy prices fell by 5.6 per cent in December, driven by a drop of 9.4 per cent in the cost of petroleum products.

Over 12 months, the price of petroleum products declined by nearly 15 per cent.

Paris - French film director and producer Claude Berri died Monday in Paris at the age of 74, French media reported.

Berri, who was admitted to hospital late Saturday after suffering a stroke, produced some of the biggest recent box office and critical hits in French cinema, including Welcome to the Sticks, The Secret of the Grain and Asterix & Obelix: Mission Cleopatra.

He also produced a number of well-known international hits, such as Roman Polanski's Tess, Taking Off and Valmont by Milos Forman and Pedro Alomodovar's Everything About my Mother.

Berri's biggest successes as a director were arguably his film versions of two novels by Marcel Pagnol, Manon of the Spring and Jean de Florette.

Paris  - Tens of thousands of people protested in Paris on Saturday Israel's attacks on the Gaza Strip, with the organizers claiming 100,000 people at the demonstration.

The demonstration was organized by the "Collective for a just and lasting peace between Israelis and Palestinians," an alliance of several lobby groups, trade unions and left-wing parties.

On January 3 in Paris, there were clashes when 21,000 people demonstrated for peace in the Gaza Strip.

There were protest marches in other French cities and towns.

Paris - Sixty-three people were reported injured Saturday in clashes between police and demonstrators who turned violent in central Algiers late Friday.

Paris - He began life 80 years ago at the age of 15, and when his career ended nearly 50 years later, his creator said he was just shy of his 18th birthday.

Tintin, the ageless boy reporter, whose adventures have delighted children and adults all over the world, is celebrating his 80th birthday on Saturday, and the globetrotting teenager with the remarkable blonde forelock has never been more popular.