Photo: AFPA French law condemning the smacking of children has been struck down by the Constitutional Council, dismaying opponents of a practice for which France has been rapped by the UN. The Constitutional Council, which vets legislation, on Thursday rejected on technical grounds a law that asked parents to swear an oath not to smack their kids. Rossignol said Friday she was particularly "shocked" that senators from the main right-wing opposition party, the Republicans, had gone to the Constitutional Council to have it overturned. "In a way they are insisting on the right to smack children," she said. In March 2015, the Council of Europe singled out France for failing to ban smacking, unlike most other European countries.

Source: The Local January 27, 2017 13:41 UTC