Read news from:
Austria
SHARE
COPY LINK

DOMINIQUE STRAUSS-KAHN

Strauss-Kahn admits making pass at author

Dominique Strauss-Kahn told police he made a pass at a young French author in 2003 but denied her rape allegations, a source told AFP Friday, as the former IMF chief prepares to speak publicly
about the sex scandals surrounding him.

Published: 16 September 2011 23:17 CEST

The 62-year-old Socialist politician, who returned to France this month after the collapse of another rape investigation against him in New York, was interviewed by French police on Tuesday over Tristane Banon’s allegations.

According to the official who is close to the inquiry and spoke on condition of anonymity, Strauss-Kahn denied the claim by Banon, now 32, that he assaulted and tried to rape her during an interview in a Paris flat eight years ago.

“But he conceded that he had made advances to her, without being very precise about the nature of these advances,” the official told AFP.

According to a report on the news website lexpress.fr, Strauss-Kahn admitted he tried to kiss Banon, but when she refused he did not insist.

In a statement sent to AFP, Strauss-Kahn’s lawyers Henri Leclerc and Frederique Baulieu said the lexpress.fr account “is consistent with what our client has always said, namely, that the scene described by Ms. Banon is imaginary.”

Banon has previously said that the portly economist grabbed her “like a rutting chimpanzee”, wrestled with her on the floor and tried to take her jeans off, forcing her to kick and punch him to escape.

She had spoken of the alleged attack on television in 2007, but only pressed charges this year after Strauss-Kahn was arrested in New York and accused of sexually assaulting Nafissatou Diallo, a hotel chambermaid.

That case was thrown out after the prosecutor lost confidence in the alleged victim’s testimony. Strauss-Kahn says he had consensual sex with Diallo.

Diallo has filed a civil complaint against him in a New York court and a judge there on Friday granted his lawyer’s request for more time to prepare their defence.

Strauss-Kahn still faces investigation in France over the Banon case, but has denied any wrongdoing and lodged a countersuit for defamation.

The Socialist politician, who many once thought had the best chance of unseating French President Nicolas Sarkozy in next year’s polls, is on Sunday expected to break his silence about the sexual assault allegations that forced him to resign his post at the International Monetary Fund to defend himself.

Strauss-Kahn has agreed to a prime time interview with the TF1 televion station, and will take questions from journalist Claire Chazal, France’s Le Point Magazine reported on its website.

Chazal is a friend and former colleague of Strauss-Kahn’s loyal wife, Anne Sinclair.

Media analysts say Chazel is not known for aggressive questioning and so Strauss-Kahn could prepare his answers in advance, but he was still taking a risk with a live television appearance.

Member comments

Log in here to leave a comment.
Become a Member to leave a comment.

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