Marine Le Pen announced on Monday night that she was temporarily stepping down as head of France's Front National party in a bid to widen her appeal ahead of next month's french presidential election run-off.

The far-Right candidate will face Emmanuel Macron, the centrist, on May 7 with the country divided as never before over Europe.

By distancing herself from the party founded by her father in 1972, Ms Le Pen hoped to reach out to potential voters who backed the Eurosceptic and protectionist far-Left candidate, Jean-Luc Mélénchon, and François Fillon, the defeated conservative, some of whose harder-line supporters could vote FN.