Tried in Paris for suspicion of secret financing of his 1995 presidential campaign, Édouard Balladur denounced at length this Wednesday a case built on "
rumors
" and "
false
"
accusations
.
Read also: Karachi case: Édouard Balladur before the judges
The day before, at the end of the long summary of the sprawling "
Karachi affair
" by the Court of Justice of the Republic, the former Prime Minister had warned: "
I will have a lot of things to say
".
When the hearing resumes this Wednesday afternoon, he denies any responsibility in a system of illegal retrocommissions linked to important arms contracts with Saudi Arabia and Pakistan.
In this case, brought to light on the sidelines of the investigation into the Karachi bombing in 2002, "
it is never a question of rumors
", calmly affirms Mr. Balladur, dark suit and purple tie.
The former tenant of Matignon, 91, had slowly advanced to the center of the courtroom, where he appears alongside his former Minister of Defense François Léotard, 78.
According to the prosecution, Mr. Balladur was, with the complicity of the latter, "
the great architect
" of this system of hidden financing, which would have served to partially fund his campaign accounts, and resulted, in June, in convictions of their relatives in the non-ministerial part of the case.
Rather than "
evidence
", he sweeps, "
this file is based on approximations, comparisons, coincidences, assumptions
".
"
With such procedures, we could condemn anyone
," says Balladur.
Heard after him, Mr. Léotard follows, in another style, the same line.
"
No relationship
" between the financing of the campaign and the arms contracts, sweeps the former minister.
To President Dominique Pauthe, who launches into an explanation of the retrocommissions system, he launches: "
It is groceries that you describe, and I am not a grocer
".
“
During that time, there was Rwanda (...), Bosnia,
” he says.
The commissions, “
I didn't take care of that
”.
As a minister, “
I only deal with heavy business
”.
Balladur claims to have defended "the national interest"
Mr. Balladur, for his part, describes at length this affair "
out of the ordinary
" by its duration - "
my trial has been open for more than twenty-five years in public opinion
" - and its "
violence
": "
Nothing is wrong. 'will have been spared
'.
He recalls that his campaign accounts were validated (in extremis) by the Constitutional Council, despite a disputed payment of 10.25 million francs (about 1.5 million euros) in cash, three days after his defeat in the first presidential tower.
For investigators, this sum corresponds to that recovered a few days earlier in Geneva through Ziad Takkiedine, sentenced in June in the non-ministerial section.
In the arms contracts, insists Mr. Balladur, "
my only role was to decide if their signature was compatible with the national interest
", in connection with the President of the Republic François Mitterrand.
In a case conducted by investigating judges with “
proven incompetence
”, “it
is said that I could not not have known (...).
Would I have the obligation to know everything and to intervene everywhere?
"
To read also: Édouard Balladur: "Let us not aggravate the traditional defect of French society, the rejection of realities"
He then returns to the Karachi attack: it was during the investigation of this attack, in which 11 French people working on the construction of submarines died, that the suspicions of retrocommissions emerged.
The investigation, still ongoing, initially focused on al-Qaida before exploring the possible links between the attack and the end of commission payments after the election of Jacques Chirac.
.
"
No one doubts my responsibility
", "
it has become a historical truth
", regrets Mr. Balladur.
“
Twenty years after this attack, justice still does not know more about its causes and perpetrators.
It's dramatic.
"
The financing of my campaign has no connection with the attack in Karachi,
" he insisted.