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Bastille Day ends with a bang as fireworks light up Eiffel Tower

Fred Dufour / AFP - Getty Images

Fireworks burst around the Eiffel Tower in Paris on July 14, 2013 as part of France's annual Bastille Day celebrations.

French President Francois Hollande urged the French to be more positive on Sunday, Reuters reported, and said that Europe's second-largest economy was recovering.

"For years we have been the most pessimistic country in Europe, in the world even. There are countries at war that are more optimistic than we are," Hollande told France 2 TV in a live Bastille Day interview.