法国执政党在地方选举中受挫

France's ruling Socialist party and its leader Francois Hollande took a drubbing in local elections Sunday from the conservative UMP party led by former President Nicolas Sarkozy and the far-right National Front - or FN - party with its anti-immigration and anti-Islam platform.

Voters went to the run-off polls to choose 4,108 people who will sit on 98 local councils.

The Socialists lost about half of their councils to the conservative UMP party, opening the way for Mr. Sarkozy to mount a campaign for another bid at the presidency in 2017.

The FN did not win an entire council, but scores of its candidates across the country won seats on local councils. The FN wins are seen as the beginning of grassroots support for the presidential campaign for the group's leader, Marine Le Pen, who has been outspoken in her views against immigration and the integration of Islam into French society.

Prime Minister Manuel Valls acknowledged the "setback" for the Socialists and said the far-right FN's gains were "too high."

Mr. Valls also said France had declared its "anger at a daily life that is too difficult" and promised to "redouble" the government's efforts to revive the French economy, the second largest in the eurozone.