ANGERS, France (AP) — Olympic figure skating champion Mikhail Shaidorov slumped to 10th on Sunday as home favorite Adam Siao Him Fa won the Grand Prix de France on Sunday.
Shaidorov's skate was packed with high-scoring jumps, but it went badly wrong in a way reminiscent of Ilia Malinin's disastrous Olympic performance, which paved the way for Shaidorov to take gold in February.
The Kazakhstan skater fell twice, including on a quadruple toeloop, and under-rotated his other three quads in the worst-scoring free skate of the day, dropping from fourth to 10th overall. He stared down at the ice and ran his hand across his hair as he finished the skate.
It was only Shaidorov's second competition since winning Olympic gold, following third place in a lower-level event to begin the season.
Siao has struggled for consistency in the past, but showed little sign of that with a strong free skate for a total of 284.24. Kao Miura of Japan shrugged off an early fall to soar from ninth to second on a 247.96 total, with South Korea's Seo Min-kyu third on his Grand Prix debut with 244.90.
European champions Anastasiia Metelkina and Luka Berulava won the pairs event despite a heavy fall for Metelkina on a throw triple loop. The Georgians rallied for a total score of 204.65 to stay ahead of Russians Aleksandra Boikova and Dmitrii Kozlovskii, competing as neutral athletes, on 197.66. Germany's Annika Hocke and Robert Kunkel won their first Grand Prix medal since 2023 with bronze on 179.74.
This was the first time a Russian entry has competed in the Grand Prix series since the 2021-22 season.
They were barred following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022 but the International Skating Union approved some neutral athletes from Russia and Belarus last season, when they were allowed only to enter the Olympics and one Olympic qualifier. They can enter a much wider range of ISU events this season.
On Saturday, Ami Nakai of Japan retained her Grand Prix de France title in the women's event and the French Olympic champion team of Laurence Fournier Beaudry and Guillaume Cizeron won the ice dance.
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FILE - Adam Siao Him Fa from France competes during the men free skating at the Figure Skating World Championships in Prague, Czech Republic, Saturday, March 28, 2026. (AP Photo/Petr David Josek, File)
PARIS (AP) — Two French news channels backpedaled and apologized this weekend after they misidentified images of protests in Albania as demonstrations taking place in France.
CNEWS made the mix-up first on Saturday, as a mass march was getting underway peacefully in southern Paris — the largest of nearly 300 demonstrations nationwide over school funding and soaring living costs that together drew hundreds of thousands of people.
But images that CNEWS showed of people gathered in protest on a street, some of them clapping and one waving a red flag, were shot not at Paris' Porte d’Italie, as labelled by the broadcaster, but in Tirana, the Albanian capital that was among multiple locations in Europe where demonstrations took place on Saturday.
Some of the people shown had covered their faces with ski goggles and masks. A commentator speaking over the CNEWS broadcast alleged they were “behaving like future vandals, like future rioters," suggesting that the Paris demonstration could turn violent, even though the images were from Albania.
There were clashes at the end of the Paris demonstration, with masked protesters hurling objects and fireworks at police, who answered with clouds of tear gas, deafening sound grenades and jets of water cannons. There was also scattered violence in other cities and towns. Police made 1,314 arrests, the Interior Ministry said Sunday.
The Associated Press also reported Saturday from Tirana and protests elsewhere. AP verified that images shown on CNEWS, labelled “Porte d’Italie (Paris)," were shot at Rruga e Durrësit, a central Tirana street.
A CNEWS presenter subsequently apologized on air for what the channel described on its website as “a confusion of images."
The presenter, Olivier Benkemoun, explained that the channel received video feeds from multiple locations and had misidentified some of the images.
“Earlier, you saw the guys who were covering their faces. Well, that wasn’t in Paris. We made a mistake in the control room,” he said.
“So, really, I want to apologize, also on behalf of the newsroom, because the images of guys covering their faces came from Albania,” he added.
Critics of the conservative news channel savaged the mistake.
“Footage from Albania to make it look like a live broadcast from Porte d’Italie! Pathetic," said far-left presidential candidate Jean-Luc Mélenchon, in a post on X.
Public broadcaster Franceinfo also confused Albania with France on Saturday.
It broadcast images of officers in riot gear advancing down a street, taking cover behind two trucks firing water cannons.
AP verified the location as Bulevardi Dëshmorët e Kombit in central Tirana. But franceinfo's television service said the images were coming live from Lyon, with a presenter saying that the situation in the city in southeastern France looked “a bit tense.”
Three minutes later, the presenter corrected the mistake.
“It followed an error on our part. These weren't live images from Lyon but were live images from Tirana,” he said.
“I present our excuses.”
Associated Press journalists Zana Cimili and Florent Bajrami in Tirana, Albania, contributed.
A protester holds a French flag during a demonstration against rising living costs in Strasbourg, France, Saturday, Oct. 24, 2026. (AP Photo/Jean-Francois Badias)
Protesters take part in an anti-government rally in Tirana, Albania, Saturday, Oct. 24, 2026. (AP Photo/Hameraldi Agolli)
