The World - News from May 17, 1988

A moderate conservative leader rejected an offer from French President Francois Mitterrand’s Socialist Party to form an alliance in next month’s general elections. Pierre Mehaignerie, president of the Social Democratic Center Party, pledged that his group would have “no negotiations with the Socialist Party and none with the National Front” of right-wing extremist Jean-Marie Le Pen. Mehaignerie was replying to a public suggestion by Socialist Party First Secretary Pierre Mauroy that the Socialists not fight for some seats in the June 5 and June 12 elections and leave them to moderate conservatives to create an “opening to the center.”