Controversy over her party's record on the fate of Jews in World War Two returned to haunt French National Front presidential candidate Marine Le Pen on Friday as the man due to replace her temporarily as party leader suddenly stood aside. 
 
 Jean-Francois Jalkh, a vice-president of the party, does not want to take up the post he was earmarked to fill because of allegations - which he firmly denies - that he made questionable remarks about Nazi gas chambers, National Front (FN) member Louis Aliot, who is also Le Pen's partner in private life, said on Friday. 
 
 "He (Jalkh) feels that the climate is not conducive for him to carry out this interim role. He wants to defend himself and he will be filing a legal complaint because he feels that his honour has been attacked and I can tell you that he firmly and formally contests what he is accused of," Aliot told BFM TV. 
 
 Steve Briois, mayor of Le Pen's flagship town Henin-Beaumont and another of the party's four vice presidents, will take his place, Aliot said. 
 
 Le Pen has worked hard to detoxify the party, tainted by racism and anti-Semitism in the past. In 2015 she expelled her father, the party's founder Jean-Marie Le Pen, from the FN, disowning his comments that the Nazi gas chambers were a "detail" of history. 
 
 Late on Thursday, FN officials cried foul after journalists commented on an article in 2005 and quotes from Jalkh that could be construed as endorsing the views of Robert Faurisson, a professor convicted in court for challenging the extent of extermination of Jews in Nazi gas chambers. 
 
 Le Pen's rival for the presidency, centrist Emmanuel Macron, is visiting the site of a Nazi massacre later Friday. 
 
 (FRANCE 24 with AP and REUTERS) 

 Emmanuel Macron visited the scene of the worst Nazi atrocity in occupied France on Friday as Marine Le Pen's Front National became embroiled in a furore over Holocaust denial allegations. 
 
 Mr Macron, 39, the favourite to win the French presidency on May 7, was shown around the village of Oradour-sur-Glane, central France, where SS troops massacred 642 people in June 1944. 
 
 He was hosted by the last remaining survivor among the six people who escaped. "To not remember is to repeat the mistakes of history," he said afterwards. 

 PARIS/CHATELLERAULT, France (Reuters) - Marine Le Pen’s bid to defy the odds and win the French presidency risked a setback on Friday when her designated stand-in as National Front party leader stood down to defend himself against charges he shares the views of Holocaust deniers. 
 
 After an intense day of campaigning ahead of a May 7 run-off vote in which both the far-right’s Le Pen and her centrist opponent Emmanuel Macron were carried back to the events of World War Two, surveys continued to show the independent Macron well ahead. 
 
 But in a couple of potential blows to the centrist favorite, defeated far-left leader Jean-Luc Melenchon stopped short of endorsing him, despite telling his faithful not to vote for Le Pen. 
 
 Election graphic: http: //tmsnrt.rs/2p6zUPE 
 
 First round election graphic: tmsnrt.rs/2lPduBG 
 
 And another loser from the first round, Nicolas Dupont-Aignan, endorsed Le Pen, as expected. 
 
 The abrupt departure of Jean-Francois Jalkh from the National Front (FN) party leadership before he had even taken on the job raised ghosts of the FN’s past and revived a furor sparked by Le Pen’s father when he called the Nazi gas chambers a “detail” of history. 
 
 The renewed controversy threatens moves by Le Pen, who expelled her father, Jean-Marie Le Pen, from the party two years ago, to cleanse the FN’s image of xenophobic and anti-semitic associations and make it more palatable to a broader electorate. 
 
 “There comes a time when the women and men of France must open their eyes to where the National Front comes from,” Macron’s campaign director Richard Ferrand said. 
 
 The presidential contest has blown apart traditional party loyalties, presenting voters with a stark choice between a resurgent far right, once a pariah in French politics, and a man whose political movement is less than a year old and who has never held elected office. 
 
 It sets Macron’s enthusiasm for the European Union and call for pro-business reforms to boost growth against Le Pen’s desire for France to close its borders to immigrants, unwind EU institutions and restrict imports to protect jobs. 
 
 Most opinion polls show him winning next Sunday, with 60 percent or more of the vote, a slightly smaller margin than a week ago. 
 
 Jalkh, a long-time ally of Le Pen senior who founded the National Front, was one of 35 FN members elected to parliament in the mid-1980s. He had been due to take over as interim party chief, a post Marine Le Pen has vacated to focus on the presidential race. 
 
 FN officials said Jalkh denies the allegations linking him to Holocaust deniers, and Le Pen herself later told BFM TV “there is no one in the leadership of the National Front who defends this sort of thesis”. 
 
 At issue are comments attributed to Jalkh in a conversation with a researcher in 2005 about the work of a professor convicted more than once for questioning the scale of Jewish extermination in Nazi gas chambers during World War Two. Also unearthed was a 1991 report that said Jalkh attended a rally held by supporters of Marshal Philippe Petain, French wartime leader and Nazi collaborator, in July of that year. 
 
 Le Pen’s father has been convicted of inciting racial hatred for his remarks on the Holocaust, and referred to them himself as recently as 2015. 
 
 Marine Le Pen (C), French National Front (FN) political party leader and candidate for French 2017 presidential election, arrives at her campaign headquarters in Paris, France, April 28, 2017. REUTERS/Charles Platiau 
 
 GAY MARRIAGE JIBE 
 
 A thorn in her side, the 88 year-old has refused to be silent as his daughter bids for power. 
 
 He courted controversy again on Friday, saying a remembrance ceremony for a policeman killed last week by an attacker in Paris “exalted” the concept of gay marriage by giving the policeman’s male partner the stage to speak in his memory. 
 
 Marine Le Pen attended the state ceremony with other political figures including Macron, and distanced herself from her father’s comment on Friday. 
 
 “I felt it was a very dignified ceremony and I was very moved by the speech of his partner,” she said. 
 
 As Le Pen and her party grappled with the latest turn of events, Macron had troubles too. 
 
 Melenchon, who came fourth in the election with about one on five votes of which about 40 percent are expected to back Macron, stopped short of endorsing him in a video released on YouTube. 
 
 Fringe right-wing candidate Dupont-Aignan, meanwhile, gave his backing to Le Pen as expected. He gathered 4.7 percent of the first round vote. 
 
 Macron on Friday campaigned at a village preserved as a monument to inhabitants killed by German SS soldiers in 1944. 
 
 Slideshow (10 Images) 
 
 “Deciding not to remember is to take the risk of repeating history,” the 39-year-old said in Oradour-sur-Glane, near Limoges in central France, a thinly veiled attack on Le Pen for the anti-immigrant policies he says are fuelling divisions in French society. 
 
 Macron later gave a speech in Chatellerault, western France, taking his election battle to rural areas where disgruntled farmers have increasingly shied away from politicians or turned to the far-right following years of crisis.
– Marine Le Pen stepped down as leader of the National Front this week to focus on her campaign for French president. On Friday, the man tapped to replace her also stepped down—after he was accused of agreeing, or at least sympathizing, with Holocaust deniers, Reuters reports. According to the Telegraph, Jean-Francois Jalkh is said to have praised the research of a Holocaust denier as "well-worked" and "rigorous" in a 2000 interview published in 2005. There are also reports he attended a rally held by supporters of a Nazi collaborator in 1991. Jalkh, who denies being a Holocaust denier but maintains it would have been "impossible" for the Nazis to use Zyklon B in the gas chambers, plans to file a legal complaint over the accusations, France 24 reports. The sudden attention on Jalkh could hurt Le Pen just over a week out from the second and final round of voting in the French presidential election. Recent polling shows her well behind centrist Emmanuel Macron, who visited the site of one of the worst Nazi atrocities in France on Friday. Le Pen has been trying to make the National Front seem less racist, anti-semitic, and xenophobic than it historically has been—even going so far as to kick her father out of the party he founded after he called the gas chambers a "detail" of history. On Friday, Le Pen said she "abhors" the theories of Holocaust deniers and there is no one in the National Front leadership "who defends this sort of thesis."