Fillon Slips Further in France as Canard Reports Putin Ties
- Paper says he fixed Lebanese billionaire’s meeting with Putin
- Putin spokesman Dmitry Peskov says report is “another fake”
Candidates Make Final Push Before French Vote
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Republican candidate Francois Fillon fell further behind in the French presidential race as satirical newspaper Le Canard Enchaine published details of his financial ties to the Russian government and prosecutors broadened a probe into his affairs.
Fillon dropped half a percentage point, to 17 percent, in an Elabe survey of first-round voting intentions to be published in Wednesday’s edition of L’Express while independent front-runner Emmanuel Macron rose a half-point, to 26 percent. Fillon, who was the favorite to be France’s next head of state less than three months ago, has seen his campaign battered by almost weekly revelations in Le Canard about his finances.