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GV INT Crowds at Communist party meeting
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SV PAN Georges Marchais receives standing ovation
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CU Marchais speaking in French "Quelque soit.."
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SV Supporters clapping and chanting
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Script is copyright Reuters Limited. All rights reserved

Background: The French Communist Party Chief Gorges Marchais told a large rally in Paris on Thursday (11 April) that the choice in the French Presidential election would be on the one hand between reactionary policies, economic stagnation and restrictions on liberty and on the other the candidate of the left putting forward progressive social policies, economic growth and the conditions of liberty.

M. Marchais was speaking at a meeting to mark the 70th anniversary of the French Communist newspaper L' Humanite.

The previous day M. Marchais said in a radio interview that if the left's sole candidate for the Presidency, Socialist leader Francois Mitterrand won, then the Communists would play a role in transforming France.

But he added "the Communist Party has not and will not make excessive demands".

M. Marchais whose party is allied with the socialiste said that the Communist party represented a force without which it was impossible to achieve the necessary transformations to help Frenchman to live better.