PARIS: France’s far-right National Front, coming off a historic electoral victory at home, is marching toward a new target: The European Parliament.

Party chief Marine Le Pen is leading the charge for continent-wide elections next month like the general of a conquering army, and hoping to attract kindred parties around Europe in a broad alliance.

Meanwhile, French President Francois Hollande on Wednesday recalled his former partner Segolene Royal from the political wilderness to join a new streamlined government, days after his Socialist Party suffered an election drubbing.

Sunday’s stinging setback in nationwide municipal elections prompted Hollande to sack former premier Jean-Marc Ayrault and replace him with tough-talking interior minister Manuel Valls. The two wasted no time in radically reshaping the government, appointing two new faces in a Cabinet of just 16 ministers, less than half the 38 in the previous line-up.

Royal, Hollande’s ex-partner and mother of his four children, was named ecology minister in a spectacular return to mainstream politics for the woman who lost the presidency to Nicolas Sarkozy in 2007.

Royal is one of the Socialists’ biggest hitters but her inclusion in Hollande’s first Cabinet was reportedly blocked because of hostility from Valerie Trierweiler, the president’s then girlfriend. That obstacle has now been removed following Hollande’s separation from Trierweiler in January in the aftermath of the revelation of his affair.