French Communist party says adieu to the hammer and sickle

PCF replaces communist symbol with five-pointed star of European far left alliance to the horror of traditionalists

France 's Communist party has undergone a revolution and dropped the hammer and sickle from its membership cards.

The party (PCF) is replacing the communism emblem of the proletariat and peasants with a five-pointed star representing the European Left, a loose alliance of far left parties, including France's Left Front . The move, announced at the party's 36th congress, which closed on Sunday, has angered traditionalists.

"Everyone in the party is shocked," Emmanuel Dang Tran, the party's Paris secretary told France Info radio. "The PCF is allowing itself and its values to be swallowed up by another organisation."

He said the hammer and sickle represented "a historic element in resistance against the politics of capitalism, for the working class of this country", and accused the party leadership of selling out to a form of social democracy made up of "Greens, socialists, Trotskyists and I don't know who else".

But Pierre Laurent, PCF national secretary, defended the decision to abandon the symbol, saying it no longer represented present-day realities.