Organisers of the Miss France beauty pageant are ‘fearing’ for the safety of their recently crowned winner over her failure to back the satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo.
Angélique Angarni-Filopon, 34, has faced a barrage of online insults including racism and ageism since she became the oldest winner of the competition last month.
It has been described by the organisers as a worrying trend of increasing levels of hatred directed towards the winners each year, The Times reported.
However Angarni-Filopon, a flight attendant from the Martinique in the Caribbean, has faced ‘unprecedented violence’ from the public.
Last week she was asked in a radio interview ‘are you Charlie?’ – a reference to the ‘Je Suis Charlie’ slogan adopted across the country in the wake of an Islamic terror attack on the magazine which killed 12 people in 2015.
She refused to answer the question which led to the magazine publishing a drawing of three mullahs holding up a sign saying ‘Je Suis Miss France’.
The drawing was captioned: ‘Miss France n’est pas Charlie’ – Miss France is not Charlie.
The massacre in 2015 was carried out by two brothers claiming allegiance to al-Qaida.
Angelique Angarni Filopon who won the Miss France 2025beauty pageant in December
The new Miss France has faced a barrage of online insults including racism and ageism
A drawing in the Charlie Hebdo magazine was captioned: ‘Miss France n’est pas Charlie’ – Miss France is not Charlie
President Emmanuel Macron (C-R) stands with Mayor of Paris Anne Hidalgo (C-L) and others marking 10 years since an Islamist attack on the Charlie Hebdo satirical newspaper
Armed with assault rifles they stormed what were then the offices of Charlie Hebdo and killed a dozen people in a bid to avenge the Prophet Mohammad nearly a decade after the atheist and frequently provocative weekly published cartoons mocking the Prophet.
Two days after they were attacked, four Jewish shoppers were murdered in the Hyper Casher kosher supermarket in Vincennes, east of Paris, by terrorist Amedy Coulibaly.
At a service to remember those who died on the 10th anniversary of the attacks, anti-semetic graffiti was seen scrawled up around the city
The killings spurred an outpouring of national sympathy expressed in the slogan ‘Je Suis Charlie’ – translating to I am Charlie – and prompted an impassioned debate about freedom of expression and religion in secular France.
Angarni-Filopon responded to the online criticism on social media, saying her response had been ‘clumsy’.
She added: ‘It would be absurd to think that I could condone such barbaric acts that bought so many families into mourning.
‘Charlie Hebdo embodies profound issues and freedom of expression is a fundamental value in France.’
Angelique Angarni-Filopon has had to apologise for her comments about Charlie Hebdo
She has suggested she may take legal action against some of her online trolls
She is not the first winner to face online abuse. Last year’s winner Eve Giles became the centre of a bizarre woke row over her short hair.
She was the first winner in the 103-year history of the pageant who didn’t have long hair – much to the dismay of some viewers.
Unimpressed viewers accused the judges of going ‘woke’ in their decision.
As well as also having short hair Angarni-Filopon has received insults about her age, despite the competitions rules changing in 2022 to allow women over 24 to take part.
The Miss France winner said in a television interview: ‘All Miss France winners pay a heavy price.
‘What people don’t realise is I have nephews that come across these comments.
‘I steel myself against them, but my nephews do not necessarily do so.’
She said she will block people who insult her online and hinted that she may take legal action against some of her trolls.
The fury comes just weeks after the country marked the 10th anniversary of the jihadist attacks.
The French President and his wife joined Charlie Hebdo’s editor for a solemn memorial on January 7 in Paris to mark the tenth anniversary of a attack on the newspaper’s offices.
Emmanuel Macron, alongside his wife Brigitte, and Paris mayor Anne Hidalgo, are leading tributes at the site of the attack where 12 people, including some of France’s most beloved cartoonists, were killed on January 7, 2015.
The commemorations include a wreath-laying ceremony and a minute’s silence at three locations in the capital.
Among those remembered was Ahmed Merabet, a police officer who was gunned down on the street while defending the satirical newspaper.
The massacre, carried out by two brothers claiming allegiance to al-Qaida, marked the start of a grim new era for France, with a wave of extremist violence pushing the country to reassess its security priorities and commitment to free speech.
The assailants, armed with assault rifles stormed what were then the offices of Charlie Hebdo and killed a dozen people in a bid to avenge the Prophet Mohammad nearly a decade after the atheist and frequently provocative weekly published cartoons mocking the Prophet.
Al Qaeda’s Yemen branch had placed Charlie Hebdo’s then editor, Stephane Charbonnier, on its ‘wanted list’ after the magazine first ran the images of the holy figure in 2006.
The gunmen killed eight members of the editorial team, including Charbonnier, and four other people before being shot dead by police.
Two days after they were attacked, four Jewish shoppers were murdered in the Hyper Casher kosher supermarket in Vincennes, east of Paris, by terrorist Amedy Coulibaly.
Like Saïd and Chérif Kouachi, the Paris-born killers of the Charlie staff, Coulibaly was himself later killed by special forces.
