(DW) French National Front leader Marine Le Pen has sharply criticised multi-lateral governance and praised the new Trump administration. She also called for a new approach towards Russia, Syria and African nations.

France’s far-right presidential front runner Marine Le Pen sounded a full-throated rejection of global trade deals and multilateral governance, defending in soaring terms Thursday the importance of cultural identity and national independence.

In a keynote foreign policy speech in Paris, Le Pen offered withering criticism of the European Union and NATO and decried what she essentially described as Western meddling in countries like Iraq, Syria, Libya, Russia and Turkey that she claimed have increased instability, broken bilateral promises and betrayed the wishes of the people.

“I don’t want to promote a French or a Western system. I don’t want to promote a universal system,” Le Pen told a packed audience of reporters, diplomats and supporters in an elegant conference hall near the Champs Elysees. “To the contrary, I want to promote a respect of cultures and peoples.”

Le Pen’s lofty discourse offered a stark counterpoint to the Front National’s more abrasive grassroots image as an anti-immigrant, anti-Muslim, populist party. She described France under her governance as a champion of “oppressed people, which speaks out for the voiceless and carries something powerful and great.”

She also took no questions and continued calmly on after a bare-chested Femen protester sought to interrupt her before being carried, still shouting, out of the room.

Scandal over EU funds

A pair of polls out Thursday confirmed Le Pen remains the favored candidate in a presidential race that has been full of surprises, despite being mired in an ongoing scandal over the alleged misuse of European Union funds to pay for several Front National staff. Still, almost every survey to date shows her winning the first round of presidential elections in April, but failing to prevail in a May runoff.

For 48-year-old Le Pen, Thursday’s speech was the second chance in a week to burnish her foreign policy credentials. European leaders have snubbed her, but she had better luck earlier this week in Lebanon, where she met with the country’s president and prime minister. She also stirred controversy by cancelling a meeting with the Lebanese grand mufti after refusing to wear a headscarf.

“Going to Lebanon showed she could look presidential,” says Philippe Moreau Defarges, senior fellow at the French Institute of International Relations in Paris. Noting the country was both a former French colony and held an important Christian community – a key theme for the National Front – he added, “it allowed Mrs. Le Pen to look like both a patriot and a Christian.”

Old and new themes

Le Pen’s address touched on some familiar themes, as she railed against the European Union, NATO and free trade. But she also waded into new territory – or at least offered new nuances – as she described forging a new relationship with Africa based on “frankness, respect and mutual cooperation.”