Paris, May 7 (IANS): Forty female French journalists have signed an open letter of complaint that harshly accuses select French politicians of making sexual, offensive insinuations that they described as "lewd paternalism".

Lenaig Bredoux, a signatory investigative journalist with the web site Mediapart, told Efe news agency: "If the situation continues, the next step will be publishing the names" of the specific politicians.

The letter came out in response to a silence that has "lasted too long", while it seeks to expose the systematic behaviour, it does not generalise the treatment, but it can often be described as "structural", Bredoux explained.

Driven by journalist Laure Bretton from Liberation daily newspaper, the initiative succeeded in collecting signatures from all over the French media: from the Paris Match weekly, France Inter radio station, the historic Le Monde, and the popular Le Parisien.

The text, which is simply called, "We, the political reporters", condemns the "intolerable" sexist behaviour exhibited by certain parliamentarians, senate members and figures from the French political class.