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CRIME

Top French central banker in corruption probe

French prosecutors said Friday that they had opened a corruption investigation into top central banker Sylvie Goulard, who simultaneously stepped down from the Bank of France.

Bank of France
The corruption probe covers suspicions of accepting bribes and influence peddling, among other things. Photo by Samuel Regan-Asante / Unsplash

The probe covers suspicions of accepting bribes, influence peddling, illegal conflicts of interest and breach of trust, the national financial prosecutor’s office said, confirming a report from daily Liberation.

Graft-fighting group Anticor triggered the probe by filing a criminal report in June, with the investigation launched in September.

In a statement, the Bank of France said Goulard – a former MEP and briefly defence minister under President Emmanuel Macron in 2017 – would be leaving her post as one of the institution’s deputy governors on December 5.

Returning to the foreign ministry?

She wished to “return to the foreign ministry” where she started her civil service career, the bank said.

A source close to Goulard told AFP that her departure had “nothing to do with the investigation”.

“Neither Sylvie Goulard nor her lawyer were informed that the investigation had been reopened,” the source said.

A previous probe in 2019 was closed the following year after no crime was found, case files seen by AFP showed.

Anticor questioned in its complaint the work Goulard performed for the California-based Berggruen Institute think-tank.

She has acknowledged accepting 10,000 euros ($10,530 at current rates) per month working as a “special adviser” to the Council for the Future of Europe, an offshoot of Berggruen, between 2013 and 2016.

Goulard’s explanation

Goulard, who was also an MEP at the time, said her work had “no relation of any kind with the business activities” of the group’s founder, German-American billionaire Nicolas Berggruen.

She said her role included “reflection, moderating groups, organizing meetings”.

Her lawyer declined to respond Friday when contacted by AFP.

The Berggruen Institute denied in 2019 that Goulard had been given a fake job, highlighting that she organised meetings in Brussels, Paris and Madrid.

Goulard has also been charged in a probe into suspected fake jobs among assistants to MEPs from the Democratic Movement, a small centrist party that supports Macron.

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POLITICS

Macron warns of ‘civil war’ if far right or hard left win election

President Emmanuel Macron warned that the policies of his far-right and hard-left opponents could lead to ‘civil war’, as France prepared for its most divisive election in decades.

Macron warns of ‘civil war’ if far right or hard left win election

French politics were plunged into turmoil when Macron called snap legislative elections after his centrist party was trounced by the far-right Rassemblement National (RN) in a European vote earlier this month.

Weekend polls suggested the RN would win 35-36 percent in the first round on Sunday, ahead of a left-wing alliance on 27-29.5 percent and Macron’s centrists in third on 19.5-22 percent.

A second round of voting will follow on July 7th in constituencies where no candidate takes more than 50 percent in the first round.

Speaking on the podcast Generation Do It Yourself, Macron, 46, denounced both the RN as well as the hard-left France Unbowed party.

He said the far-right “divides and pushes towards civil war”, while the hard-left La France Insoumise, which is part of the Nouveau Front Populaire alliance, proposes “a form of communitarianism”, adding that “civil war follows on from that, too”.

Reacting to Macron’s comments, far-right leader Jordan Bardella told French news outlet M6: “A President of the Republic should not say that. I want to re-establish security for all French people.”

Bardella, the RN’s 28-year-old president, earlier Monday said his party was ready to govern as he pledged to curb immigration and tackle cost-of-living issues.

“In three words: we are ready,” Bardella told a news conference as he unveiled the RN’s programme.

READ ALSO What would a far-right prime minister mean for foreigners in France?

Bardella has urged voters to give the eurosceptic party an outright majority to allow it to implement its anti-immigration, law-and-order programme.

“Seven long years of Macronism has weakened the country,” he said, vowing to boost purchasing power, “restore order” and change the law to make it easier to deport foreigners convicted of crimes.

He reiterated plans to tighten borders and make it harder for children born in France to foreign parents to gain citizenship.

Bardella added that the RN would focus on “realistic” measures to curb inflation, primarily by cutting energy taxes.

He also promised a disciplinary ‘big bang’ in schools, including a ban on mobile phones and trialling the introduction of school uniforms, a proposal previously put forward by Macron.

Prime Minister Gabriel Attal of Macron’s Renaissance party poured scorn on the RN’s economic programme, telling Europe 1 radio the country was “headed straight for disaster” in the event of an RN victory.

On Tuesday, Attal will go head-to-head with Bardella and the leftist Manuel Bompard in a TV debate.

On foreign policy, Bardella said the RN opposed sending French troops and long-range missiles to Ukraine – as mooted by Macron – but would continue to provide logistical and material support.

He added that his party, which had close ties to Russia before its invasion of Ukraine, would be “extremely vigilant” in the face of Moscow’s attempts to interfere in French affairs.

Macron insisted that France would continue to support Ukraine over the long term as he met with NATO chief Jens Stoltenberg.

“We will continue to mobilise to respond to Ukraine’s immediate needs,” he said alongside Stoltenberg at the Elysee Palace.

The election is shaping up as a showdown between the RN and the leftist Nouveau Front Populaire, which is dominated by the hard-left La France Insoumise.

Bardella claimed the RN, which mainstream parties have in the past united to block, was now the “patriotic and republican” choice faced with what he alleged was the anti-Semitism of Mélenchon’s party.

La France Insoumise, which opposes Israel’s war in Gaza and refused to label the October 7th Hamas attacks as ‘terrorism’, denies the charges of anti-Semitism.

In calling an election in just three weeks Macron hoped to trip up his opponents and catch them unprepared.

But analysts have warned the move could backfire if the deeply unpopular president is forced to share power with a prime minister from an opposing party.

RN powerhouse Marine Le Pen, who is bidding to succeed Macron as president, has called on him to step aside if he loses control of parliament.

Macron has insisted he will not resign before the end of his second term in 2027 but has vowed to heed voters’ concerns.

Speaking on Monday, Macron once again defended his choice to call snap elections.

“It’s very hard. I’m aware of it, and a lot of people are angry with me,” he said on the podcast. “But I did it because there is nothing greater and fairer in a democracy than trust in the people.”

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