1,702 names of winners were revealed this Saturday, January 18 by the Grand Chancellery and in the Official Journal. Among them, actors, economists and politiciansbut also around a hundred craftsmen involved in the reconstruction of Notre-Dame de Paris cathedral.
Among the winners, Philippe Jostat the head of the public establishment responsible for the restoration project of the cathedral, devastated by a fire in 2019, is distinguished “commander” within the Legion of Honor. This senior official succeeded General Jean-Louis Georgelin, who died in 2023 and himself a Grand Cross, the highest grade of this award founded by Napoleon Bonaparte.
Alongside him, around a hundred craftsmen, contractors, work supervisors and operations directors were named “knights” (33 to the Legion of Honor and 67 to the National Order of Merit). In total, “1,702 people are distinguished in national orders” which reward their commitment to serving the general interest and the influence of France.
Former decorated ministers
“482 receive the Legion of Honor in the traditional January promotion and 1,119 the National Order of Merit in a promotion usually published in November – two offbeat promotions due to ministerial changes. In addition to these two expected promotions, there is a special promotion rewarding with these national distinctions 101 people who worked on the reconstruction of Notre-Dame de Paris,” specifies the Grand Chancellery in a press release.
Among the promotion of the Legion of Honor, the actresses are named “knight” Camille Cottin or Mélanie Thierrythe singer Etienne Dahothe comedian Laurent War and former ministers Rima Abdul Malak, Clement Beaune, Olivier Dussopt, Marlène Schiappa and Amélie Oudéa-Castéra. Ministers cannot be appointed or promoted to the Legion of Honor during the duration of their ministerial function.
The CEO of the Dassault group in the list
The personalities named “officers” of the Legion of Honor include Odette Bergoffen, former resistance fighterDominique Erignac, president of the Claude Erignac association (former prefect of Corsica assassinated in office in 1998, Editor’s note), Jacques-Charles Fombonne, president of the SPA, or Bixente Lizarazu, former footballer and sports consultant.
The Nobel Prize in economics Jean Tirole and the new CEO of the Dassault group Eric Trappier are distinguished “commander”, the journalist and novelist Philippe Labro becomes “grand officer” and Jacques de Larosière, economist and honorary governor of the Bank of France, member of the Academy of Moral and Political Sciences, is elevated to the rank of “grand ‘cross”.
-Among the personalities consecrated by the National Order of Merit, are the speaker and former deportee Lili Leignel (“Commander”), the actress Marie-Christine Barrault or the psychiatrist and psychoanalyst Boris Cyrulnik (both “grand officer”).
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