Nicolas Sarkozy was struggling on Thursday to reassert his image as a humble man of the people after newspaper allegations that he benefited from a substantial discount on a luxury apartment in Paris' wealthiest suburb.
France's rightwing interior minister and presidential hopeful has denied he received a discount on his former apartment or made a business deal with property developers -- accusations which could damage his campaign as the champion of a new morally "irreproachable" France.
On Thursday his allies complained of a dirty tricks campaign, saying sleaze allegations were dragging France's election race into the gutter.
A report in the satirical weekly Le Canard Enchaine on Wednesday alleged that in 1997 Sarkozy, mayor of the Parisian suburb of Neuilly, and his wife Cecilia bought a six-bedroom duplex apartment in the area for significantly less than the market price. They paid about 876,000 euros (US$1.15 million) for the apartment -- between 12 per cent and 35 percent less than the price per meter of other apartments in the same building, the report said.
The newspaper also alleged that the building's property developer carried out free renovations on the apartment overlooking the Seine. In total, the couple saved around 300,000 euros, according to the report. Sarkozy, who is still mayor of Neuilly, sold the apartment late last year for nearly 2 million euros.
Although newspapers yesterday accepted that Sarkozy had done nothing illegal, the left-leaning daily Liberation said any suspicion could taint the presidential candidate, who has spoken of "moral standards" in his campaign.
Sarkozy denounced the allegations as "extreme, ridiculous and opportunistic." He said he called in local tax officers at the time to confirm he was paying the right rate for the apartment, adding that some flats in the same building were sold for less.
Asked last weekend in a TV interview what he would do if he won the lottery, he said he would buy a house.
"I don't have one," he said. "I had an apartment and sold it. I am now renting. I have dreamed for a long time about buying a house for my family."
Opinion polls this week have given him a narrow edge over his Socialist rival Segolene Royal in the two-round presidential election next month and in May.
MONEY MATTERS: Xi was to highlight projects such as a new high-speed railway between Belgrade and Budapest, as Serbia is entirely open to Chinese trade and investment Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic yesterday said that “Taiwan is China” as he made a speech welcoming Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) to Belgrade, state broadcaster Radio Television of Serbia (RTS) said. “We have a clear and simple position regarding Chinese territorial integrity,” he told a crowd outside the government offices while Xi applauded him. “Yes, Taiwan is China.” Xi landed in Belgrade on Tuesday night on the second leg of his European tour, and was greeted by Vucic and most government ministers. Xi had just completed a two-day trip to France, where he held talks with French President Emmanuel Macron as the
With the midday sun blazing, an experimental orange and white F-16 fighter jet launched with a familiar roar that is a hallmark of US airpower, but the aerial combat that followed was unlike any other: This F-16 was controlled by artificial intelligence (AI), not a human pilot, and riding in the front seat was US Secretary of the Air Force Frank Kendall. AI marks one of the biggest advances in military aviation since the introduction of stealth in the early 1990s, and the US Air Force has aggressively leaned in. Even though the technology is not fully developed, the service is planning
INTERNATIONAL PROBE: Australian and US authorities were helping coordinate the investigation of the case, which follows the 2015 murder of Australian surfers in Mexico Three bodies were found in Mexico’s Baja California state, the FBI said on Friday, days after two Australians and an American went missing during a surfing trip in an area hit by cartel violence. Authorities used a pulley system to hoist what appeared to be lifeless bodies covered in mud from a shaft on a cliff high above the Pacific. “We confirm there were three individuals found deceased in Santo Tomas, Baja California,” a statement from the FBI’s office in San Diego, California, said without providing the identities of the victims. Australian brothers Jake and Callum Robinson and their American friend Jack Carter
CUSTOMS DUTIES: France’s cognac industry was closely watching the talks, fearing that an anti-dumping investigation opened by China is retaliation for trade tensions French President Emmanuel Macron yesterday hosted Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) at one of his beloved childhood haunts in the Pyrenees, seeking to press a message to Beijing not to support Russia’s war against Ukraine and to accept fairer trade. The first day of Xi’s state visit to France, his first to Europe since 2019, saw respectful, but sometimes robust exchanges between the two men during a succession of talks on Monday. Macron, joined initially by EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, urged Xi not to allow the export of any technology that could be used by Russia in its invasion