Jean-Marie Le Pen suspended as Front National's president of honour after refusing to attend disciplinary meeting over Nazi remarks

Mr Le Pen says it is below his 'dignity' to be disciplined by the party he founded

Marine Le Pen, leader of the Front National, with her father, Jean-Marie (AP)

The French far right patriarch Jean-Marie Le Pen has been suspended from the party that he founded for a series of extreme remarks last month defying the softer line adopted by his daughter Marine.

The executive committee of the National Front also called a special party conference to abolish Mr Le Pen’s position as liftetime “president of honour”.

Defiant to the end, Mr Le Pen, 86 refused to attend the meeting called to punish him for, amongst other things defending the Vichy regime which collaborated with the Nazis during the 1939-45 war

Mr Le Pen, 86, said it was below his “dignity” as president of honour of the Front National (FN) to be disciplined by the party he had founded. He said that in future he would speak for “myself” – implying that he intended to become a permanent critic of his daughter’s attempt to deodorise the party.

Jean-Marie Le Pen may be stripped of his title in the Front National, which he founded (AP)

Earlier, the FN’s governing body – despite vitriolic opposition from Mr Le Pen and a small band of supporters – condemned the remarks he made last month minimising the Holocaust, defending the Nazi-friendly Vichy regime and warning that the “white world” was threatened.

FN sources had warned of a permanent schism in the party if the drastic step of suspending the man who founded the party was taken. “It would open the gates of hell,” one party official said.