• Xavier Bertrand (DVD) sued Damien Rieu (Reconquest!) for defamation.

  • The remarks reproached to the defendant, support of the RN at the time, go back to the campaign for the last regional elections.

  • A trial that could end in a dismissal due to a risk of prescription in the procedure.

It is not in a peaceful context that the trial of Damien Rieu, former identity activist, former close to the RN and current member of Eric Zemmour's party, Reconquest!, was held this Tuesday in Lille.

While the case of Imam Iquioussen is still fresh, as the trial of the Nice attack opens, Damien Rieu will have to answer for defamation to envy the president of Hauts-de-France, Xavier Bertrand.

The latter had in fact taken him to court after the distribution, during the last regional elections, of a leaflet entitled “The 6 Islamic sins of Xavier Bertrand”.

During the regional elections of June 2021, which allowed Xavier Bertrand to be re-elected, Damien Rieu, co-founder of Génération identitaire, a far-right movement dissolved in March 2021, campaigned on the networks for the candidate of the RN, Sébastien Oak.

Very active on Twitter, where he had already nicknamed his opponent "Imam Xavier Bertrand", Damien Rieu had relayed a leaflet from the RN accusing the former minister of financing, supporting or promoting Islam, even Islamism.

Accusations that the identity, accustomed to defamation trials, reiterated in a video, published on Twitter on Sunday.

Xavier Bertrand does not dispute "the sufficient factual basis"

At the hearing, only the defendant was present.

But he did not have the political platform he could have hoped for.

Indeed, in his 22-page complaint, Xavier Bertrand does not dispute "the sufficient factual basis", namely the 6 facts denounced by the leaflet, underlines Maître Pierre-Vincent Lambert, lawyer for Damien Rieu.

Still according to the defence, the regional president even recognizes them, "at least for the subsidy for the Averroès high school and the Islamic radio, since he wanted to abolish these subsidies".

On the basis of these “6 sins”, even the plaintiff's lawyer believes that it is not up to him “to say whether it is true or false”.

For Xavier Bertrand, it is therefore the overtones of the leaflet, namely favoritism and clientelism towards the Muslim electorate, which constitute defamation.

“This tweet aimed to denounce the double discourse of Xavier Bertrand.

That of the TV sets where he warns against Islamism, and his actions, when he finances such associations, ”argues Damien Rieu.

Eric Morin, lawyer for the president of the region, sees it more as a personal attack, "because Xavier Bertrand has always shown a harsh and old opposition to the National Front".

Possible prescription

Anyway, there is very little chance that the trial will lead to anything other than a dismissal.

Both the prosecution and the defense and the prosecution agree on a problem of limitation, the procedure having taken five months when it should have asked for only three.

A delay that Me Morin tries in particular to put on the back of Damien Rieu, who refuses to give his address for “security issues”.

"I don't want to end up like Salman Rushdie," he told the court.

Deliberate on October 11.

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  • Justice

  • Lille

  • Court case

  • Xavier-Bertrand

  • Defamation

  • Islam

  • Hauts-de-France

  • Identity generation