Two months after the second round of the snap parliamentary elections, President Emmanuel Macron has appointed Michel Barnier as France’s new prime minister.

The nomination comes after weeks of increasing pressure from all political groups to nominate a candidate.

A statement from Macron's office announcing Barnier's appointment said he'd been tasked "with forming a unifying government to serve the country and the French people."

"This appointment comes after an unprecedented cycle of consultations during which, in accordance with his constitutional duty, the President ensured that the Prime Minister and the future government would meet the conditions to be as stable as possible and give themselves the chances of uniting as broadly as possible," the statement said.

Barnier will now have to survive a no-confidence vote in the National Assembly, France’s lower house of the parliament.

The current National Assembly is divided into three blocs: the left-wing coalition NFP (that won the most seats but fell short of an absolute majority), Macron’s centrist group and the far-right National Rally.

Given the composition of the National Assembly, the president had set himself the task of finding a prime minister capable of gathering "the broadest and most stable majority possible.”

Barnier, a conservative, was twice the European Commissioner and, between 2016 and 2021, the chief EU negotiator for Brexit.

French politicians react — some calling for protests

National Rally's Jordan Bardella reacted to the news out of the Élysée on X by saying that the party "acknowledged" Barnier's appointment after a wait "unworthy of a great democracy".

"We will ask for the major emergencies of the French people (such as) purchasing power, security and immigration, to finally be addressed, and we reserve all political means of action if this is not the case in the coming weeks," the far-right party's president said.

“The election has been stolen from the French people," said Jean-Luc Melenchon, leader of French left's largest party France Unbowed (LFI), speaking in the wake of Barnier's appointment.

"We don't believe for a moment that there will then be a majority in the National Assembly to accept such a denial of democracy", Mélenchon continued.

The three-time presidential candidate also called for "the most powerful mobilisation possible" in the streets on 7 September, the day of the demonstration planned by LFI.

NFP coalition's Greens told Euronews that, by appointing Barnier, Macron went against the voters by allowing the National Rally "to be the arbiter ... and has turned his back on the millions of voters who, in the ballot box, made a historic republican barrage in France."

"Obsessed with preserving his neoliberal record and his determination not to see the pension reform repealed, Emmanuel Macron has dismissed the New Popular Front, opting instead to align himself with the radicalised right," the Greens said.

The Communist party also reacted negatively to the news of Barnier's appointment, telling Euronews in a statement that he was "the right wing’s choice to continue the President's policies."

"Right up to the end, the President used every means at his disposal to circumvent the results of the ballot box," party representative Fabien Roussel said.