Two Greenpeace activists who removed French President Emmanuel Macron's waxwork from a Paris museum to stage anti-Russia protests were on Thursday charged with aggravated theft, their lawyer said.

The pair have now been released, but their lawyer, Marie Dose, said the activists, a man and a woman, spent three nights in a cell in "absolutely appalling conditions".

"I found out this morning that I was going to be charged," one of the charged activists, who did not wish to be named, told AFP.

"I find it a bit much, all this for exercising my freedom of expression in France."

On Monday, several activists stole a 40,000-euro statue of Macron from the Grevin Museum and placed it in front of the Russian embassy. On Tuesday they placed Macron's double outside the headquarters of French electri

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