France's Fillon under pressure to end presidential bid

French centre-right presidential candidate Francois Fillon 
has denounced a left-wing "institutional coup d'etat" as he faces mounting pressure to quit the presidential race.

He has become mired in a scandal surrounding claims
 that his Welsh-born wife Penelope was paid large sums 
over a number of years for "fake jobs".

Far-right rival Marine Le Pen said he had lost voters' confidence.

And there was stinging criticism from his own side too.

One Republican MP, Georges Fenech, said that Mr Fillon's victory in the party's primaries in November had become "obsolete". He said the affair was not just a judicial matter
 but an ethical  and moral one, and an urgent decision had 
to be made.

Recently the favourite to win the presidency in elections 
in April and May, he has now slipped behind Ms Le Pen and centrist Emmanuel Macron. Mr Fillon said he would fight
 the accusations "to the end" on Wednesday but commentators suggested his fate was slipping out 
of his hands.

Socialist candidate Benoit Hamon ridiculed the idea of a 
left-wing coup, saying it was "a bit curious to search for
 plots where there aren't any".

Francois Fillon's chances of political survival are hanging 
on a thread, and if you want to know why just listen to 
French talk radio.

This morning on RMC when broadcaster Jean-Jacques Bourdin took calls about Penelopegate, the mood was
 angry.

Caller after caller pointed up the vast difference in their 
own salary, and the money - up to €10,000 ($10,800; £8,540)
 a month - which Penelope Fillon took as her husband's
parliamentary assistant. "And I actually work!" said one.

And in the Republican Party, what was unthinkable a few 
days ago is now outwardly mooted: that Francois Fillon 
may need to step down and be replaced.

TV news channels in France were running constant 
coverage of Mr Fillon's plight, which began a week ago with 
an expose in satirical weekly Le Canard Enchaine and has become the main story in the campaign.

The newspaper alleged on Tuesday that Penelope Fillon
 had been paid €830,000 (£710,000; $900,000) for working
 as a parliamentary aide first to her husband and then to 
his replacement as MP, Marc Joulaud, far more than it had originally claimed.

That was on top of the €100,000 that it says she was paid
 by a literary review owned by a wealthy friend of her husband called Marc Ladreit de Lacharriere.