This is the Global News Podcast from the BBC World Service.

I'm Bernard Ekheo and in the early hours of Monday, July the 1st,

these are our main stories.

The French elections exit polls show that the national rally of Marine Le Pen has won the biggest share of ballots in the first round of voting.

Democracy is spoken and the French voters have clearly expressed their wish to start afresh

after seven years of contemptuous and corrosive power.

Twelve out of 32 ministries in South Africa's new cabinet go to the opposition in the first

government to include non-Anc ministers since the advent of democracy. And the Prime

Minister of St Vincent and the Grenadines tells us about the approach of Hurricane

Beryl.

Also in this podcast, the UN holds talks with the Afghan Taliban government in Qatar, is bringing them to the table,

giving them implicit recognition. Australia introduces some of the world's toughest new regulations

on vaping, and Islam meets heavy metal.

The Indonesian hijab wearing women who played Glastonbury.

It seems that the French President Emmanuel Macron's gamble has spectacularly backfired.

In the first round of his snap parliamentary election, his rival, the far-right National

Rally Party, is projected to have come out on top with exit polls predicting that it took

34% of the vote in the first round. A left-wing coalition came second on 28% with

Mr Macron's centrist alliance trailing well behind on 22%.

Maureen Le Penh is the National Rally's leading figure and she's been celebrating her party's success.

My dear compatriots, democracy has spoken and the French people have placed the national

rally and its allies on top and a practically erased President Macron's block.

...