The newspaper argued that the right-wing Front National could win the upcoming presidential election in France. At least 37% currently support the chairman of the National Front, Marine Le Pen, as a candidate for this nomination. Le Pen's party is critical of the EU policies and supports the idea of France leaving the Union.
"Any country can be excluded from the European Union," said Hollande in an interview with France Inter radio: "Europe has […] legal tools to prevent a country from violating democratic principles," the politician added.
According to him, the EU should be able to exclude those countries where there are violations of freedom of the media and human rights.
"It could come as far as this," Hollande said, adding that the EU should initiate procedures to exclude such countries from the Union, and referred to Poland as the most recent example of practices contradictory to the EU's approach.
According to recent surveys, three quarters of the French don't want to see either Hollande or his conservative predecessor Nicolas Sarkozy as candidates in the presidential election next year.
According to a poll published in January by the newspaper Le Parisien, only 24 percent of French voters would like to see Hollande or Sarkozy as presidential candidates, while 74 percent of respondents are against the nomination of both politicians.
