Tunisian accused says cannot remember 2020 France church killings

PARIS: France’s Culture Minister Rachida Dati is to go on trial accused of corruption and abuse of power while she was a European Parliament member, a judicial source told AFP on Tuesday.

Dati, a high-profile minister who holds ambitions to become Paris mayor next year, was placed under investigation in 2019 on suspicion she lobbied for the Renault-Nissan car group while at the European Union institution.

Dati, 59, denies the allegations. She did not respond to an AFP request for comment.

“We will appeal this decision today,” Dati’s lawyers, Olivier Baratelli and Olivier Pardo, told AFP.

Dati, a daughter of working-class North African immigrants, was defiant in comments made Monday ahead of the decision.

“I will lead you to victory. Some people are trying to attack me over my private life, over many aspects that are collateral to my candidacy,” said Dati, who is mayor of the French capital’s 7th district that is home to most French ministries, the country’s parliament and many foreign embassies.

“I am not afraid of anything or anyone.”

Dati, who was justice minister under right-wing leader Nicolas Sarkozy from 2007 to 2009, will remain in the government, said an associate of President Emmanuel Macron.

“The president has taken note of the decision to refer Rachida Dati to the criminal court. As a referral is not a conviction, she will continue her work,” said the associate on condition of anonymity.

Dati is accused of accepting 900,000 euros ($1 million) in lawyer’s fees between 2010 and 2012 from a Netherlands-based subsidiary of Renault-Nissan, but not working for them, while she was an MEP from 2009 to 2019.

Investigations have sought to determine whether she carried out banned lobbying for the carmaker at the European Parliament.

In their order signed on Tuesday, a copy of which was seen by AFP, the investigating magistrates said that Dati’s activities in parliament “amounts to lobbying,” which “appears incompatible with both her mandate and the profession of lawyer.”

Initially placed under the more favorable status of assisted witness — a step before being indicted — in 2019, Dati was charged in 2021.

She has since repeatedly sought to have the charges quashed.

French investigating magistrates also ordered that Carlos Ghosn, the former Renault-Nissan chairman and chief executive, be tried, the judicial source said.

The 71-year-old, who has been living in Lebanon for years after escaping arrest in Japan, has also rejected the charges against him.

A hearing on September 29 will decide on the date of the trial, the source said.

According to another source following the case, the trial could be held after the Paris municipal elections in March next year.

“She will go until the end,” Jean-Pierre Lecoq, mayor of the French capital’s 6th district and one of Dati’s close associates, said on Tuesday.

Ghosn, who headed the Renault-Nissan alliance, was arrested in Japan in November 2018 on suspicion of financial misconduct, before being sacked by Nissan’s board.

He jumped bail the following year and made a dramatic escape from Japan hidden in an audio-equipment box, landing in Beirut, where he remains as an international fugitive.

Japan and France have sought his arrest.

Ghosn’s lawyers did not respond to a request for comment.

WASHINGTON : The Department of Justice wants to interview Jeffrey Epstein’s former girlfriend, who was convicted of helping the financier sexually abuse underage girls and is now serving a lengthy prison sentence, a senior official said Tuesday.

If Ghislaine Maxwell “has information about anyone who has committed crimes against victims, the FBI and the DOJ will hear what she has to say,” Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche said in a post on X, adding that President Donald Trump ”has told us to release all credible evidence.”

A lawyer for Maxwell confirmed there were discussions with the government.

The overture to attorneys for Maxwell, who in 2022 was sentenced to 20 years in prison, is part of an ongoing Justice Department effort to cast itself as transparent following fierce backlash from parts of Trump’s base over an earlier refusal to release additional records in the Epstein investigation.

As part of that effort, the Justice Department, acting at the direction of the Republican president, last week asked a judge to unseal grand jury transcripts from the case. That decision is ultimately up to the judge.

Epstein, who killed himself in his New York jail cell in 2019 while awaiting trial, sexually abused children hundreds of times over more than a decade, exploiting vulnerable girls as young as 14, authorities say. He couldn’t have done so without the help of Maxwell, his longtime companion, prosecutors say.

The Justice Department had said in a two-page memo this month that it had not uncovered evidence to charge anyone else in connection with Epstein’s abuse. But Blanche said in his social media post that the Justice Department “does not shy away from uncomfortable truths, nor from the responsibility to pursue justice wherever the facts may lead.”

He said in his post that, at the direction of Attorney General Pam Bondi, he has “communicated with counsel for Ms. Maxwell to determine whether she would be willing to speak with prosecutors from the Department.” He said he anticipated meeting with Maxwell in the coming days.

A lawyer for Maxwell, David Oscar Markus, said Tuesday in a statement: “I can confirm that we are in discussions with the government and that Ghislaine will always testify truthfully. We are grateful to President Trump for his commitment to uncovering the truth in this case.”