Chirac to avoid corruption trial
Prosecutors say former president has no case to answer after 10-year investigation into alleged misuse of public money
A LONG-RUNNING investigation into alleged corruption by former French president Jacques Chirac looks likely to be dropped after prosecutors decided he had "no case to answer."
Judges have been looking for the past 10 years into claims of misuse of public money by Chirac and about 20 others during his time as mayor of Paris between 1977 and 1995.
Charges were filed against him in 2007 after he stepped down as president and lost the judicial immunity that comes with the job.
According to today’s edition of satirical magazine Le Canard Enchainé, the Paris prosecutor’s office has asked investigating judge Xavière Simeoni to drop the case.
The Parquet de Paris said it was too late to pursue Chirac for offences alleged to have taken place before 1992. It also decided that the former president “did not show a manifest intention to break the rules.”
Chirac was accused of paying close friends and aides to do jobs that did not exist. He has repeatedly denied any wrongdoing and insists that the jobs were necessary to ensure the good running of the city.
Meanwhile, Chirac’s prime minister during his 12-year presidential tenure, Dominique de Villepin, is due to give evidence today in the Clearstream trial.
He is accused of hatching a plot to disrupt Nicolas Sarkozy’s 2007 presidential campaign by helping to leak fake claims that Sarkozy benefited from illegal commissions from the sale of warships.
