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DOMINIQUE STRAUSS-KAHN

‘I slept with Strauss-Kahn’: accuser’s mother

The mother of a French journalist who claims Dominique Strauss-Kahn tried to rape her says she had a consensual but "brutal" sexual encounter with the former IMF chief before the alleged attack on her daughter.

Published: 19 July 2011 14:18 CEST
Updated: 20 July 2011 04:21 CEST
Speaking to French news weekly L'Express, Anne Mansouret, 65, said she told investigators last week that she had sex with her Socialist Party colleague in the offices of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) in Paris, where Strauss-Kahn worked as a special advisor to the secretary general of the organisation.

Investigators have been taking evidence into the accusation by Mansouret's daughter Tristane Banon, a 32-year old writer and journalist, that Strauss-Kahn tried to rape her in 2003.

Banon claims that the attack took place when the two were alone in a private apartment in Paris. She had gone there to interview him for a book she was writing.

She initially made the allegation on a television show in 2007, but the former IMF chief's name was bleeped out to hide his identity.

Mansouret has previously revealed that she advised Banon not to report the alleged attack as she felt that the risk of the case being dismissed was too great.

Mansouret says she has decided to reveal details of her own experiences with her one-time friend because she believes the portrayal of Strauss-Kahn by his friends and associates as an almost harmless “inveterate charmer” is wide of the mark.

Far from being someone who is incapable of being violent towards women, she believes he is a sexual predator who takes what he wants and behaves with “the obscenity of a boor”.

According to Mansouret's account, after hearing her daughter's version of what had happened that evening, she called Strauss-Kahn's first wife, Brigitte Guillemette. Guillemette, who is also godmother to Tristane, then spoke to Strauss-Kahn who admitted what he had done, saying “I don't know what came over me. I slept with the mother and I just lost it when I saw her daughter.”

However, she decided to meet Strauss-Kahn to discuss the issue. According to her, he was remorseful and sorry for what had happened, saying that he hadn't wanted to hurt Tristane. 

She also claims to have had an exchange with François Hollande, then general secretary of the Socialist Party and currently running to be the party's candidate in next year's presidential elections. Hollande will also be questioned by investigators about the charges.

Brigitte Guillemette told L'Express that she rejects Mansouret's version of events. “It's all false” she said, “and we told that to the investigators last week.”

Le Parisien has also reported that Guillemette plans to launch a libel action against Mansouret for her claim that she knew her ex-husband had inappropriate relations with students when he taught at the University of Nanterre.

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ECONOMY

World unprepared for next financial crisis: ex-IMF chief Strauss-Kahn

The world is less well equipped to manage a major financial crisis today than it was a decade ago, according to Dominique Strauss-Kahn, a former chief of the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

Published: 9 September 2018 14:08 CEST
World unprepared for next financial crisis: ex-IMF chief Strauss-Kahn
Former French Economy Minister and former managing director of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) Dominique Strauss-Kahn , poses during a photo session in Paris on Thursday. Photo: JOEL SAGET / AFP
In an interview with AFP, the now-disgraced Strauss-Kahn — who ran the fund at the height of the 2008 financial meltdown — also said rising populism across the world is a direct result of the crisis. 
 
Strauss-Kahn resigned as head of the IMF in 2011 after being accused of attempted rape in New York, although the charges were later dropped. He settled a subsequent civil suit, reportedly with more than $1.5 million.
 
Q: When did you become aware that a big crisis was brewing?
 
A: When I joined the IMF on Nov 1, 2007, it became clear quite quickly that things were not going well. That is why in January 2008, in Davos, I made a statement that made a bit of noise, asking for a global stimulus package worth two percent of each country's GDP. In April 2008, during the IMF's spring meetings, we released the figure of $1,000 billion that banks needed for their recapitalisation.
 
Q: Did the Bush administration grasp the danger of Lehman Brothers going bankrupt?
 
A: No, and that is why Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson decided not to save Lehman, because he wanted to make an example of it in the name of moral hazard. Like everybody else, he considerably underestimated the consequences. Allowing Lehman to go under was a serious mistake. Especially because only a week later they were forced to save the insurer AIG, which was much bigger.
 
Q: Ten years on, are we better equipped to deal with a crisis of such a magnitude?
 
A: No. We have made some progress, particularly in the area of banks' capital adequacy ratios. But that is not nearly enough. Imagine Deutsche Bank suddenly finding itself in difficulty. The eight percent of capital it has at its disposal are not going to be enough to solve the problem. The truth is that we are less well prepared now. Regulations are insufficient.
 
Q: How so?
 
A: After 2012-2013 we stopped talking about the need to regulate the economy, for example concerning the size of banks, or concerning rating agencies. We backtracked, which is why I am pessimistic about our preparedness. We have a non-thinking attitude towards globalisation and that does not yield positive results.
 
Q: Do we still have international coordination?
 
A: Coordination is mostly gone. Nobody plays that role anymore. Not the IMF and not the EU, and the United States president's policies are not helping. As a result, the mechanism that was created at the G20, which was very helpful because it involved emerging countries, has fallen apart. Ten years ago, governments accepted leaving that role to the IMF. I'm not sure it is able to play it today, but the future will tell.
 
Q: Do you believe that Donald Trump's election is a consequence of the crisis?
 
A: I believe so. I'm not saying that there was a single reason for Trump's election, but today's political situation is not unconnected to the crisis we lived through, both in the US with Trump and in Europe.
 
Q: Connected how?
 
A: One of the consequences of the crisis has been completely underestimated, in my opinion: the populism that is appearing everywhere is the direct outcome of the crisis and of the way that it was handled after 2011/2012, by favouring solutions that were going to increase inequalities.
 
Quantitative easing (by which central banks inject liquidity into the banking system) was useful and welcome. But it is a policy that is basically designed to bail out the financial system, and therefore serves the richest people on the planet.
 
When there's a fire, firemen intervene and there is water everywhere. But then you need to mop up, which we didn't do. And because this water flowed into the pockets of some, and not of everyone, there was a surge in inequality.
 
By AFP's Antonio Rodriguez