Marine Le Pen’s political career lies in tatters.

After decades of plotting her ascent to the very pinnacle of French politics, she has now been pushed down the mountain, and her fall could be long and painful.

The far-right leader, who had been the narrow favourite to win the 2027 French presidential election, will now be banned from running for public office for five years as part of a criminal conviction.

Marine Le Pen latest: ‘Catastrophic end of political career’

Le Pen, along with politicians and assistants from her National Rally (RN) party, has been found guilty of embezzlement – of taking millions of euros that were supposed to support work in the European Parliament and instead funnelling it to the party’s work elsewhere.

She will almost certainly appeal, but her ban has already come into effect.

Le Pen left the court in Paris shortly before her punishment was announced, heading towards her party’s headquarters for a meeting with its president, Jordan Bardella – the man most likely to take her place.

“Today, it is not just Marine Le Pen who is being condemned unjustifiably,” said Bardella. “It is French democracy that is being executed.”

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Her downfall will be welcomed by some in France as a sign that politicians are not above the law.

Others, though, have already bemoaned the fact that a court has been given the power to disbar one of the nation’s most popular political leaders.

It hasn’t taken long for the court’s decision to be politicised. The Kremlin talked about European countries “trampling democratic norms”.

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban put out a short statement of support saying “Je Suis Marine”.

Assuming that Le Pen does not win her appeal, the favourite to win the 2027 election may now be Edouard Philippe, the former prime minister.

Bardella may benefit from being Le Pen’s anointed successor, but at 29, he is extremely youthful – a full decade younger than anyone who has ever won the presidency.

Video from the Myanmar earthquake has revealed the terrifying ordeal of being trapped in the rubble of a collapsed building.

The footage shows two girls, aged 13 and 16, and their bloodied grandmother in a debris-filled space after Friday’s powerful 7.7-magnitude quake.

They became trapped as they fled their sixth-floor apartment in the country’s second biggest city of Mandalay – near the epicentre of the earthquake – and ran for the emergency stairs.

The girls’ father initially believed his daughters and mother had died and appealed for help on social media to retrieve their bodies.

But they were alive – and had grabbed their phones in the moments before the building collapsed.

Writing on Facebook, he said: “My daughters recorded videos on their phones, thinking that if they and grandma died, their phones might be found, and their father and mother, would see them.

“They even unlocked their phones.”

He said his family could hear others trapped underneath them in the wreckage of the Sky Villa apartment block.

“They called out to each other from above and below, but there was no sound from the outside. As hours passed, they became disheartened and held hands with grandma, crying,” he said.

Rescuers eventually found them and used a hammer to make a small hole to pass them water, but they had to leave to get more equipment.

Left alone for some time, the girls took matters into their own hands and used the hammer to make a gap for them to escape.

“They wanted to make a bigger opening for grandma, but the large stones were too heavy, and both sisters couldn’t move them,” said the man’s post.

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‘Gasping for breath’

Rescuers returned and managed to pull the girls out.

Their 75-year-old grandmother was “gasping for breath” and could not fit through – but was also later rescued.

“I am deeply grateful to my mother and my two daughters for enduring this ordeal with such strong spirits,” the man wrote.

“These are the words my daughters shared with me after their trauma had subsided.

“At a time when all hope was lost, I bow my head in reverence and gratitude to the Lord Buddha for allowing our family to survive together.”

More than 1,700 people are now said to have died in Myanmar following the quake, according to state media on Sunday.

Eighteen were also killed in Thailand but dozens more remain unaccounted for. Hopes of people surviving in rubble diminish after 72 hours.

The UN is rushing aid supplies to survivors in Myanmar but the rescue effort is complicated by the fact that many roads, bridges, rail lines and airports have been damaged.

The country is also in the middle of an ongoing civil war that has taken a heavy toll on the health system and displaced more than three million people.

The first orbital rocket launched from mainland Europe took off from Norway on Sunday – but crashed into the sea and exploded 40 seconds later.

The unmanned Spectrum rocket blasted off from the Arctic Andoeya Spaceport, on Sunday at 12.30pm local time before it was terminated less than a minute later.

Isar Aerospace, the German company that built the rocket, had warned that the launch could end prematurely. It maintained that despite being short, the flight had produced extensive data that its team could learn from.

“Our first test flight met all our expectations, achieving a great success,” Daniel Metzler, Isar’s chief executive and co-founder, said.

“We had a clean lift-off, 30 seconds of flight and even got to validate our flight termination system.”

Spectrum is a two-stage launch vehicle specifically designed to put small and medium satellites into orbit.

Its maiden voyage was aimed at kickstarting satellite launches from Europe.

Several European nations, including the UK and Sweden, have said they want to be an active player in the growing market of commercial space missions.

Big global companies already ahead in the satellite launch game include Elon Musk’s SpaceX, which launches from the US, and French company ArianeGroup, a joint venture between Airbus and Safran that uses a spaceport in South America’s French Guiana.

Mr Musk’s SpaceX also operates the Starlink satellite service, a communications network that can provide much of the globe with access to the internet.

Germany’s BDLI aerospace industries association said Isar’s first flight would lead to further progress.

BDLI managing director, Marie-Christine von Hahn, said: “Europe urgently needs to ensure its sovereignty in space. Elon Musk’s Starlink is not without alternatives – nor should it be.”

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Sweden, with its Esrange launch site, and Britain with its SaxaVord Spaceport in the Scottish Shetland Islands, are the nearest rivals to the Norwegian site, all of which aim to give Europe greater autonomy in space flights.

SaxaVord, which suffered a setback when a rocket engine exploded during a test last year, is planning its first satellite launch later this year.