Free Republic

PARIS — President Chirac could become the first former French president to be questioned over alleged criminal acts while in office. Judges intend to question Mr. Chirac in the coming weeks despite his claims of immunity from prosecution. Recently discovered documents suggest Mr. Chirac could be at the heart of the Clearstream scandal — described as the French Watergate. Judges will question his former prime minister, Dominique de Villepin, on September 13.

PARIS - Investigating judges plan to file preliminary charges against former Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin over a smear scandal targeting Nicolas Sarkozy before he became the French president, Villepin's office said Tuesday. The case stems from an attempt in 2003-2004 to use false accusations of secret bank accounts to taint Sarkozy, who was a government minister at the time and a political rival of Villepin within the conservative camp. Sarkozy and other prominent figures were falsely accused of having secret bank accounts in the Luxembourg clearing house Clearstream, purportedly created to hold bribes from a 1991 sale of frigates...

Paris - Two French magistrates investigating an attempt to smear President Nicolas Sarkozy on Thursday searched the Paris residence of former prime minister Dominique de Villepin, who has been implicated in the affair by a former espionage official, France-Info radio reported. The search by judges Jean-Marie d'Huy and Henri Pons followed testimony by a former senior official in France's counter- intelligence service, General Philippe Rondot, that Villepin was behind the attempt to implicate Sarkozy in an affair involving illegal payments into foreign bank accounts. According to the internet site of the daily Le Monde, Rondot told the two judges...

PARIS (Reuters) - French Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin said on Friday he had been the victim of "calumny and lies," as he emerged from 17 hours of questioning by magistrates over an apparent smear campaign against a political rival. Villepin was heard as a witness, not a suspect, in the so-called Clearstream affair, which revolves around faked bank accounts and hushed-up government probes. But commentators said the prime minister's image had suffered. The marathon session, interrupted only by lunch and a break in which media said Villepin did some push-ups, ended at 3 a.m. (0200 GMT) on Friday. The...

When an anonymous letter-writer exposed corruption in France’s defence industry, a sinister drama unfolded, involving the Russian mafia and a chain of unexplained violent deaths. And the trail leads all the way to Chirac himself. The twilight years of Jacques Chirac’s France have not been easy for the French state. It has endured economic decline, ethnic tension and vicious infighting among its political elite. Now the electorate is gripped by a political and financial scandal, with potentially grave if not cataclysmic consequences that may stretch as far as the Elysée Palace. At the heart of the scandal is an anonymous...

If you haven’t been following the Clearstream scandal in France, you’re in for a good guffaw. Chirac and his chief Musketeer, Prime Minister Dominique Galouzeau de Villepin, have been caught in the act of some old-fashioned political skullduggery. And this time, it looks like someone has barred the doors. Remember: this is the French president who could face an indictment on corruption charges the minute he leaves the Elysee palace, stemming from his days as Mayor of Paris. (Chirac allegedly kept a safe full of cash inside his office toilet, said to be kickbacks from municipal contractors, as I reported...