Nicolas Sarkozy said he could see a wave rising. For once he was right. The wave's coming; it's high, its strong, and it's going to smack him in the face.

My real adversary has no name, no face, no party. It will never be elected, yet it governs - the adversary is the world of finance.

There cannot be prosperity without security.

We find ourselves in a difficult situation in Europe. There's a crisis, weak growth, unemployment... my duty is to ensure that by the end of my mandate France is in a better state than it was at the beginning.

France, after the month of May, will share trust with the current leadership of the United States which, on many subjects, has tended to take useful positions in our view.

I'm not a lukewarm European. I know that the German-French friendship is indispensable, no matter who the countries' leaders are.

We are near, very near, to an end to the eurozone crisis... The worst - in the sense of the fear of the eurozone breaking up - is over. But the best isn't there yet.