Was DSK set up?

One of the stranger stories to emerge over the weekend was the claim that former IMF chief Dominique Strauss-Kahn may have been set up and may have been the victim of a conspiracy by his main political rival, French President Nicolas Sarkozy.

Whether the later was involved in the events leading to arrest at the Sofitel hotel back on the 14th May is unclear but Edward Jay Epstein’s piece in the current New York Review of Books certainly is asking some questions

Epstein recounts that he had a serious problem with one of his BlackBerry cell phones and he had received a text message that morning from Paris from a woman friend temporarily working as a researcher at the Paris offices of the UMP, Sarkozy’s center-right political party.

She warned DSK, that at least one private e-mail he had recently sent from his BlackBerry to his wife, Anne Sinclair, had been read at the UMP offices in Paris.

Epstein then recounts the events that led to DSK being arrested on a charge of sexual assault,indicted by a grand jury on seven counts of attempted rape, sexual assault, and unlawful imprisonment, placed under house arrest for over a month before all the charges were dismissed by the prosecutor on August 23, 2011.

In the two months his career was finished and the man seen as most likely to topple Sarkozy was out of the running for President.

It's worth reading Epstein's version of events but whether they amount to conspiracy we shall probably never know

Sarkozy and Netanyahu will probably not be exchanging Xmas cards then

Just when you think it couldn't get any worse for the French president it does.

Nicolas Sarkozy has been caught calling Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu a "liar" in a private conversation with President Obama overheard by journalists.

It came after the two leaders appeared together at a news conference during a G20 summit meeting in Cannes last Thursday, they retired to a room for what they thought was a private conversation.

The report on this website says that Obama chided Mr. Sarkozy for not warning him that France would vote to admit the Palestinians into UNESCO.

The two men began discussing the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu.

“I cannot stand him,” Mr. Sarkozy was quoted as saying. “He is a liar.”

Mr. Obama is reported to have replied, “You’re fed up with him, but I have to deal with him every day!”

Cameron-faling out with Europe

Besides upsetting most of Europe when imitating a German accent whilst explaining why he is against ID cards,he has also upset Mr Sarkozy.

The FT reports that

Nicolas Sarkozy, the French president, was asked this week about the pledge of David Cameron, the UK opposition Conservatives’ leader, to hold a referendum on the treaty if he comes to power before it is fully ratified. The French leader’s response was ­telling.
“I am watching the debate in that country,” Mr Sarkozy said. “I simply want to say that we have been happy to have Gordon Brown round the table with us because he has assumed his responsibilities and he has acted with courage by bringing his country with him on the path of European integration.”

The snub that was never there

Charles Bremner gets it about right when he comments on the case of the French president and her majesty over the D-Day celebrations

The Elysée Palace failed to factor in British emotion over the war, ancient suspicion of France and the skill of the British media at whipping the two together.

The story that the French president has snubbed her majesty led in this morning's Mail,but according to Charles the palace has denied a rift

we are told that there is no anger and no perceived snub. The Royal family had not expected to be invited and had not put out feelers, a senior British official told me. The Queen attended ceremonies in Normandy for the 50th and 60th anniversaries, but the 65th was not planned as an international event.