Europe 1 with AFP 2:45 p.m., June 15, 2022

Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne spoke on Wednesday on the case of Damien Abad, Ministers of Solidarity targeted by a new accusation of attempted rape published Tuesday by Mediapart.

While traveling in the context of the legislative elections, the Prime Minister invited women victims of sexual violence to file a complaint.

Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne, on a campaign trip to Calvados on Wednesday, invited women victims of sexual violence to file a complaint, assuring that she could not comment "about an anonymous testimony" accusing Damien Abad of an attempt of rape.

The Minister of Solidarity, already implicated for sexual violence, is targeted by new accusations from a woman who says she suffered an attempted rape in 2010, according to her story published Tuesday by Mediapart.

>> LISTEN - 

Damien Abad case: Marine Turchi's investigation

"Everything is done to welcome women as well as possible"

"It is essential that on these subjects, the voice of women (...) be heard. You understand that I cannot comment on the basis of anonymous testimonies", she declared to the press on the Villers-Bocage market, in the 6th district of Calvados, where she is campaigning for the legislative elections.

"As Prime Minister, I also say it as a woman, we must allow justice to establish the facts. We must not hesitate to file a complaint. (...) I am not a judge and investigations are not carried out with anonymous testimonies. Everything is done to (...) welcome women as well as possible so that they can file a complaint and that justice can establish the facts", she added.

In the testimony collected by Mediapart, "Laëtitia" (assumed name), an "elected centrist", accuses Damien Abad of having tried to rape her during a party organized at his home in Paris in the first half of 2010. Without explicitly mentioning a complaint, his lawyer, Maître Raphaële Bialkiewicz, told Mediapart that she was proceeding "to the collection and cross-checking of elements, with a view to providing all the necessary follow-ups".

These accusations come after those published by the online media on May 20, the day after the appointment of Damien Abad as Minister of Solidarity, Autonomy and Disabled People: two women, quoted by Mediapart, accused the new minister of raped in 2010 and 2011.