Christophe Girard, former deputy of Anne Hidalgo in charge of Culture at the mayor of Paris.
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AFP
The former deputy mayor of Paris Christophe Girard, targeted by an investigation for "rape", said Friday that the case had been "instrumentalized" in order to harm him politically.
"I would know one day who exploited this affair against me, to bring me down, but I did not fall, I am alive", he declared on BFM-TV.
The Paris prosecutor's office had opened on August 18 an investigation for "rape by a person in authority", before dismissing the procedure "due to the acquisition of the prescription of public action".
The ex-deputy had, him, denounced allegations "serious" and "without foundation", contesting any sexual relation with this man.
A "well-organized political coup"
"I have always condemned pedophilia," said the former deputy mayor on BFM-TV on Friday.
And Christophe Girard also castigate a “society of denunciation” and “ukases and small political assemblies”.
In an article published on August 16 by the American daily
New York Times
, Aniss Hmaïd testified to his meeting with Christophe Girard in Tunisia in the summer of 1989, when he was 15 years old, and then to have been drawn into an abusive relationship. of nearly ten years which left him "lasting psychological wounds".
It was this testimony that led to the opening of an investigation by the Paris prosecutor's office.
A powerful figure in the cultural policy of the city of Paris, Christophe Girard had already been pushed at the end of July to resign from his post of deputy mayor because of his links with the writer accused of pedophilia Gabriel Matzneff.
According to him, the campaign of which he was the subject was a "well organized political coup."
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