萨科奇：选举败北将退出政界

Nicolas Sarkozy has said he will give up politics if he fails to be re-elected president of France at the election this spring.

法国总统萨科奇称，此次总统选举如果败北，他将退出政界。

Opinion polls suggest he is lagging behind Socialist challenger Francois Hollande, who is expected to face him in a second round run-off on 6 May.

Critics accuse Mr Sarkozy of competing for votes with the far right by saying France has too many foreigners.

National Front hopeful Marine Le Pen is struggling to qualify for the election.

Mr Sarkozy, 57, is coming to the end of his first term as president, before which he served as a cabinet minister under his predecessor, President Jacques Chirac.

His political career stretches back to the early 1980s when he served as a district mayor in Paris.

Speaking to French broadcaster BFMTV on Thursday, Mr Sarkozy said "I tell you, yes" when asked whether he would quit politics if defeated.

Mr Sarkozy stirred controversy this week by saying in a TV debate that there were too many foreigners in France and the system for integrating them was "working worse and worse".

He promised to reduce the number of immigrants to France from 180,000 a year to 100,000 if re-elected.

Mr Sarkozy, who is himself the son of a Hungarian immigrant, also said he wanted to restrict some benefit payments to immigrants who had been in the country for 10 years.