French presidential candidate Francois Fillon attempted to fight back on 2 February as pressure mounted on him to quit the race. Some lawmakers from his own side have urged him to drop his scandal-tainted bid to save the conservatives from defeat.Fillon has denied wrongdoing after Le Canard Enchaine newspaper reported the former prime minister had paid his wife hundreds of thousands of euros for work she may not have done.But Fillon pressed on with his campaign, telling a rally of about 1,000 people to help him resist against orchestrated efforts by his political opponents to break him and the party.He once again defended his actions as nothing illegal and sought to grab back the political high ground by attacking the other presidential candidates.
