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French press review 1 October 2011

Saturday’s French newspapers are dominated by reactions to the string of scandals rocking President Sarkozy’s presidency.

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Le Figaro rolls it out for the controversial state prosecutor Philippe Courroye who is facing investigation for his suspected role in the Bettencourt affair.

The close friend to the president denies ordering the police to tap the phones of journalists looking into suspected illegal campaign funding by one of France’s richest ladies.

"Yes I’m close to President Nicolas Sarkozy, so what?", holds the man of law, continuously dogged by suspicions, that he has been obstructing the prosecution of affairs that could mess up Sarkozy’s presidency.

Philippe Courroye tells Le Figaro they are trying to turn him into a delinquent to smear him. He says he will not step down if he is indicted.

AFP / TF1

Le Figaro also gives prominence to the well-choreographed attempt by President Sarkozy’s senior adviser Brice Hortefeux, to deny accusations that he breached the confidentiality of a judicial investigation.

Hortefeux actually called a suspect in a campaign financing scandal, another Sarkozy friend, to warn him his wife was talking too much.

On prime time television Friday, the former interior minister went on the offensive saying he is the victim of what he called “stinking balls” thrown at the president.

Libération also gives the floor to businessman Ziad Takieddine, the intermediary who is at the heart of three scandals rocking the Elysée. Takieddine has been indicted for giving false evidence and complicity to abuse state property in the so-called Karachi affair.

It is alleged that kickbacks from arms sales to Pakistan, brokered by Takieddine went to finance the 1995 presidential campaign of Sarkozy’s mentor Edouard Balladur and that a 2002 Karachi bombing that killed 11 French engineers was revenge for the cancellation of bribes secretly promised to Pakistani officials.

Takieddine explains to Libération his intermediary role in the negotiation, the signing and execution of the grand contracts, his ties with Claude Guéant, former secretary general of the Elysée, now interior minister, UMP party chief François Copé and Nicolas Sarkozy.

Libé points out that a furious Takieddine has asked President Sarkozy to lift the state secrets shield barring the publication of documents relating to the arms deal to facilitate the quest for truth.

The papers also examine another scandal that is set to undermine the reputation of the police as the force’s top chiefs face investigation in the journalists’spy case.

Le Monde takes up the arrest of the deputy head of judicial police in Lyon as well as two of his close aides for corruption, money laundering and drug trafficking.

Aujourd’hui en France reports that police investigators actually found out that Commissioner Michel Neyret actually supplied drugs seized by his services to dealers in his region of command.

Libération wonders how 55 year-old Neyret tumbled from super cop to gang leader. The newspaper says the former crime buster is now languishing in a police cell in Paris as he awaits his fate.

The irony about Michel Neyret, revealed by Libé, is that he inspired the hero of a new crime-busting film by one of his former colleagues, Olivier Marchal, who left his police job in Versailles to take up film-making.

The papers look ahead to the intense lobbying already underway as the French senate prepares to elect its new president this Saturday.

The left now holds a comfortable majority in the Upper House after Sunday’s polls but Liberation notes that the canvassing for votes is being marred by tensions and temptations within the leftist majority and inside the losing ruling party alliance.

Le Monde looks at how the left is manoeuvring to lockup the election. Libération says the Socialists’ chief whip Jean-Pierre Bel is widely-favoured to win the vote.

Both Aujourd’hui en France, Libération and even the very right-wing Le Figaro bet on Bel defeating the incumbent Gerard Larché after the Centrists broke ranks with the UMP and announced they would file a candidate of their own.

The French papers also examine a wild rumour circulated on the web which sent thousands of children into the streets on Friday. The children went on the rampage after false rumours spread that President Nicolas Sarkozy's government wants to take away a large slice of their school holidays.

Aujourd’hui en France reports that the protests that began in northern France spread to the outskirts of Paris, where police said they arrested 10 people after high-school students rioted, damaging cars by turning them on their side or smashing windows.

The popular Le Parisien newspaper notes with surprise the Ministry’s refusal to comment on the rumours. According to the paper, the main students’ union sees the incidents as the translation of a deep malaise in schools about the government’s plans to reform the academic program.
 

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