Reprieves ram trapped among the French (3-3)

I believe the answer is:

let-ups

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'reprieves' is the definition.
I don't know anything about this answer so I can't tell whether it can be defined by this definition.

'ram trapped among the french' is the wordplay.
I cannot really understand how this works, but
'ram' could be 'tup' (synonyms) and 'tup' is found within the answer.
'the french' could be 'les' (plural form of 'the' in French) and 'les' is located in the remaining letters.
No letters remain.
This may be the basis of the clue (or it may be nonsense).

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I've seen this clue in The Independent.

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