Marine Le Pen's attempts to convince voters that she has modernized the views of her far-right Front National party have come into question after she questioned the French state's role in the Holocaust.

Le Pen suggested France was not responsible for the wartime round-up of Jews who were sent to Nazi death camps. With just 13 days until the first round of voting in France's presidential election, her remarks have been met with widespread condemnation.

Her stance is at odds with former president Jacques Chirac and current premier Francois Hollande, who have both apologized for the role played by French police in the rounding up of 13,000 Jews at the Vel d'Hiv cycling track in Paris, ordered by the Nazis in July 1942.