Dominique de Villepin 'Guilty by Abstention', Says Prosecutor

THE DAILY TELEGRAPH: A French state prosecutor urged an appeals court on Monday to find former prime minister Dominique de Villepin guilty of complicity in a plot to discredit President Nicolas Sarkozy in the run up to an election in 2007.

Prosecutor Jean-Louis Perol asked the court in Paris to hand Mr Villepin, a possible candidate in the presidential election next April and an arch-enemy of Mr Sarkozy, a suspended jail sentence of 15 months.

Mr Villepin, who has quit Mr Sarkozy's centre-right UMP party, was acquitted last year in the first round of the trial but has landed back in court after an appeal by prosecutors.

He lashed out at the prosecution's demands in a trial where the verdict, due to be handed down in the autumn, could poison the climate in the run-up to a presidential election. Mr Sarkozy is widely expected to run for a second term. » | Tuesday, May 24, 2011

Villepin : deaux années de diatribes contre Sarkozy
Depuis leur opposition dans l’affaire Clearstream, Dominique de Villepin a distillé maintes critiques à l’égard du chef de l’Etat

French Authorities to Appeal Against Dominique De Villepin Acquittal
THE GUARDIAN: Justice officials seek retrial of former prime minister over Clearstream smear campaign against President Nicolas Sarkozy

French justice authorities will appeal against the judgment clearing the former prime minister Dominique de Villepin of involvement in a plot to smear President Nicolas Sarkozy, the Paris state prosecutor said today.

"I have decided to file an appeal against this decision," Jean-Claude Marin told Europe 1 radio. "Whatever happens, there will be a second trial."

A retrial would offer Sarkozy one last chance to see his loathed rival convicted of allegedly orchestrating the campaign against him.

De Villepin denounced what he called "a political decision" which showed "that Nicolas Sarkozy prefers to persevere in his fury, in his hatred".

De Villepin was cleared yesterday of all charges levied during the "Clearstream affair", leaving Sarkozy disappointed and humiliated. >>> Lizzy Davies in Paris and agencies | Friday, January 29, 2010

Nicolas Sarkozy Humiliated as de Villepin Cleared of Smear Charges
THE TELEGRAPH: Dominique de Villepin, the former French prime minister, was cleared on Thursday of charges that he plotted to smear his arch-rival Nicolas Sarkozy and scupper his campaign for the presidency in 2007.

Dominique de Villepin*. Photograph: The Telegraph
The verdict in the Clearstream case is a hammer blow to Mr Sarkozy, a civil plaintiff in the case whose enmity towards Mr de Villepin - an eloquent former diplomat - is legendary. The president reportedly told aides during the investigation: "When I shoot, it's to kill, not to wound." However, the acquittal has revived Mr de Villepin's political ambitions, turning him into a potentially dangerous fellow Right-wing contender for the presidency in 2012.

The Clearstream case centred on a bogus list of account holders at a financial clearing house in Luxembourg who allegedly took bribes from the sale of French warships to Taiwan.

The president, one of 39 plaintiffs, had reportedly promised to "hang on a butcher's hook" whoever had tried to discredit him by adding his name to the list and sending it to an investigating magistrate in 2004. At the time, he and Mr de Villepin were locked in a vicious battle to succeed the then president Jacques Chirac, under whom both had served as ministers. Mr Sarkozy went on to win the presidency while Mr de Villepin's political career remained in limbo following his order to stand trial.

One of five defendants, Mr de Villepin had faced a five-year prison term and 45,000-euro (£41,000) fine for complicity to slander, complicity to use forgeries, dealing in stolen property and breach of trust.

But in a 326-page ruling read out to a packed Paris courtroom, the judge on Thursday said while Mr Villepin had handled the bogus list, there was no firm proof that he knew it was falsified nor that he had sought to discredit Mr Sarkozy by having it sent to a judge. >>> Henry Samuel in Paris | Thursday, January 28, 2010

*Gel bronzant par Clinique, peut-être, M. de Villepin?

Sarkozy and de Villepin Enter Court Battle Over Alleged Smear Campaign
THE GUARDIAN: Smear campaign charges centre on kickback claims / Clearstream trial threatens to damage country's elite

It has been billed as France's political trial of the decade, a saga worthy of the darkest spy thriller that threatens to expose poisonous machinations and backstabbing at the highest reaches of the French state.

Tomorrow morning, in the courtroom where Marie-Antoinette was ordered to be beheaded in 1793, a legal battle will begin that is unprecedented in modern French history. France's president, Nicolas Sarkozy, is the key plaintiff in a trial accusing the former prime minister Dominique de Villepin of running an elaborate smear campaign to damage Sarkozy's chances in the 2007 presidential election campaign. If De Villepin is found guilty of a plot to torpedo Sarkozy's political career, he could face five years in prison.

But the so-called "Clearstream" trial involves not just the all-consuming hatred and rivalry between two of France's most prominent politicians. It also threatens to damage the standing of the French intelligence services and business world. Scores of plaintiffs and witness from the highest levels of French politics, senior spies and businessmen, will take part in the trial which former president Jacques Chirac once warned would damage the entire French political class.

Sarkozy is so bent on justice that he has vowed to hang those responsible for the alleged plot "on a butcher's hook". De Villepin, who privately refers to Sarkozy as "the dwarf", denies wrongdoing, saying the president is "obsessed" and "meddling" in the justice system by forcing the case to trial.

The saga dates back to 2004, when Sarkozy and De Villepin were rival ministers under Chirac and both possible runners for the 2007 presidency. Sarkozy, the young, ambitious finance minister who had turned against Chirac, his one-time mentor, was the favourite to lead the country. De Villepin, who served as foreign and interior minister before becoming prime minister, was an aristocratic career diplomat, a Napoleon fan who Chirac called his "commando-in-chief".

In the summer of 2004, an anonymous source wrote to one of France's investigating judges, accusing a string of politicians and businessmen of holding secret bank accounts at the Luxembourg bank Clearstream. The accounts were said to have been used for laundering kickbacks from the £1.5bn sale of French frigates to Taiwan in 1991. On the lists of supposedly crooked account holders were scores of politicians from the right and left, top businessmen, leading journalists, even a famous female actor. … >>> Angelique Chrisafis in Paris | Sunday, September 20, 2009