DOMINIQUE STRAUSS-KAHN has said he feels “infinite regret” over his sexual encounter with a New York hotel maid, acknowledging a “moral error” but insisting he did not act violently.
In his first interview since his arrest on sexual assault charges in May, the former chief of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) last night told French television he regretted his “inappropriate” sexual encounter in the Manhattan hotel, intimating he might have been the victim of a trap.
Responding gravely and slowly to questions from TF1 anchor Claire Chazal – a friend of his wife, Anne Sinclair – Mr Strauss-Kahn said: “What happened involved neither violence nor aggression nor any criminal act. It was not a paid-for encounter, it was a moral lapse. I’m not proud of it and I regret it, and I don’t think I’ll ever stop regretting it.”
He wronged not only his wife and family, but the French people, he said, adding: “It was a moral error . . . I regret it infinitely.”
The case against Mr Strauss-Kahn for alleged sexual assault was dropped last month after doubts were raised about the credibility of his accuser, Nafissatou Diallo. Appearing pale and uncomfortable, the former finance minister held aloft a copy of the New York public prosecutor’s report into the case and said there were no traces of violence on either him or Ms Diallo, a 32-year-old Guinean immigrant.
“It was the prosecutor who said there was no trace of violence,” he said. “The prosecutor said Nafissatou Diallo lied about everything . . . The charges were abandoned. They were abandoned because there was no basis on which to pursue them.”
Mr Strauss-Kahn still faces a civil action in the US, but said he had no intention of negotiating to avert it, and suggested Ms Diallo may have been driven by “financial motivations”. Asked by Ms Chazal whether he believed he was the victim of “external intervention”, he replied: “A trap? It’s possible. A plot? We’ll see.”
Mr Strauss-Kahn was questioned last week by police investigating separate claims by the writer Tristane Banon that he attempted to rape her during an interview in 2003. Last night he dismissed those allegations as “imaginary” and “slanderous”, and said there was no aggression or violence involved.
At the time of his arrest in May, Mr Strauss-Kahn was the frontrunner to challenge President Nicolas Sarkozy in the 2012 election. His arrest caused a sensation in France, and changed the political landscape. He confirmed last night he had planned to seek the Socialist Party’s nomination, but events in New York meant he had “missed my rendezvous with the French people”.
“All that is behind me. Quite obviously, I’m not a candidate,” he said. He would not get involved in his party’s primary campaign nor endorse any of the six candidates.
The Strauss-Kahn case divided opinion in France, but an opinion poll in yesterday's Journal du Dimanchenewspaper found 53 per cent of those surveyed wanted him to announce he was retiring from politics.
His party colleagues cheered his release last month, but senior figures have sounded lukewarm about him taking a role in their campaign, with several reported to be lobbying for him not to publicly endorse them.
A quarter of last night’s 20-minute interview – the terms of which were agreed over days of talks between TF1 and Mr Strauss-Kahn’s entourage – was devoted to global economic matters. Asked where he saw his future, he stressed his interest in economics. “I want to take the time to reflect. But all my life has been devoted to making myself useful, for the public good. We’ll see.”