Former prime minister will run as independent, spicing up the race between bitter rival Nicolas Sarkozy and François Hollande
Former French prime minister Dominique de Villepin, who gained international renown as the country's spokesman against the war in Iraq, has shaken up the presidential campaign by announcing that he will run as an independent.
The Sunday night announcement on French television is likely to complicate life for both the Socialist candidate, François Hollande, and President Nicolas Sarkozy, who runs the UMP party that Villepin served under.
By positioning himself as a centrist, Villepin could siphon votes from the other candidates. But the move was primarily seen in France as a warning shot to Sarkozy, as despite inhabiting the same conservative side of the political spectrum, the pair are bitter rivals.
Villepin was acquitted in September of charges that he took part in a smear campaign against Sarkozy. On Sunday, he criticised the president for not protecting France's interests at a recent EU summit and imposing several rounds of budget cuts.
With growth slowing and more difficult cuts ahead, both Hollande and Sarkozy have tried to paint themselves as beyond partisanship. This is possibly because they fear both established parties will be blamed for the country's high debt levels and poor economy.
Sarkozy has not even officially declared his candidacy yet, saying that in this time of crisis, he needs to focus on being a leader, not a candidate.
Villepin said his candidacy will eschew party politics and distanced himself from the UMP. "I am not for the republic of parties. I don't believe that truth lies on the right, on the left or in the centre," he hold TF1 television.
He added that France had been humiliated by "the law of the markets that keep imposing on us more austerity".
He also dismissed a deal forged last week to bind the countries that use the euro closer together, which gave officials in Brussels more oversight over national budgets. Sarkozy and the German chancellor, Angela Merkel, were the primary authors of the accord.
"We're falling in line behind interests that are not those of France. I think we need more courage than that," Villepin said.
UMP members denounced Villepin's decision, saying he risked splitting the party. While Villepin has little chance of winning it's still unclear whether he would get all of the mayoral signatures he needs to officially enter the race.
In the 2002 presidential elections, a plethora of Socialist candidates cleared the way for far-right National Front candidate Jean-Marie Le Pen to make it into a runoff with then president Jacques Chirac, a result that stunned many across Europe.
"Only the largest union of the forces, ideas and convictions of the right and centre will allow us to be in a position to carry the 2012 campaign," UMP member Valérie Rosso-Debord said.
"The risk of the opposite on 21 April is real and we call on all of our political family to gather and mobilise in face of the left and the National Front."
The election will take place over two rounds in April and May. Another National Front candidate, Le Pen's daughter Marine, is also running this year. She held her first campaign meeting on Sunday, calling for a negotiated exit from the euro and criticising her rivals for being too pro-Europe and anti-France.
Best known internationally for his impassioned 2003 UN speech against the US invasion of Iraq, Villepin served as foreign and interior minister under Chirac before being named prime minister. He left the office when Sarkozy became president.