September 26, 2007 (the date of publication in Russian)
Alexander Rublev
A ST. BARTHOLOMEW'S NIGHT FOR GAULLISTS
Are Jacque Chirac and Dominique de Villepin going to be jailed?
In mid-September, French President Nicolas Sarkozy made clear that his breakaway from the political tradition of Gaullism is going to be expressed not only in the change of the political course but also with a legal lynching of those French statesmen who personify de Gaulle's legacy. The recently elected President declared that he is not going to withdraw his action against Dominique de Villepin, the former Prime Minister to whom Mr. Sarkozy had been subordinated in his capacity of Minister of Foreign Affairs. The legal case involves the name of ex-president Jacques Chirac, whose official expression of support to Sarkozy has not gained him any reliable guarantees of personal security from the ungrateful heir.
Sarkozy alleged that de Villepin had planted a real conspiracy against him in the so-called Clearstream case. This scandal, breaking out in 2004, was focused on secret personal accounts of French officials in Luxembourg banks, supposedly related to provisions from illegal deliveries of weapons to Taiwan. This compromising information subsequently proved to be falsified, and the French justice started seeking for the abetters of the libel. In December 2006, de Villepin already testified on the case and was believed to have answered all the questions related to his competence. However, as soon as Sarkozy was inaugurated, de Villepin underwent a new criminal investigation, being charged of involvement in false denunciation, concealment of information, and complicity in forgery, implying a five-year term of confinement. This practically meant that de Villepin's hopes for a business career in the capacity of chairman of EADS, the top European aerospace corporation, have failed.
The pretext for the new investigation was provided by a very timely occurrence. The investigators suddenly discovered a file discrediting de Villepin, which was earlier supposed to have been erased from his PC. After repeated interrogation, de Villepin was left under house arrest on bail with no right to meet with other suspects, including ex-President Chirac. Recently, the sum of bail was reduced from 200,000 to 50,000 Euro with a right for free travel inside and outside France. In this way, Sarkozy confronts the ex-Prime Minister with an alternative: either jail, or emigration. Meanwhile, de Villepin has nowhere to escape, except probably Algeria, where he is popular after his intervention in the youth unrest in the outskirts of Paris in November 2005 when he gained a reputation of a protector of Arabs.
In his turn, Jacques Chirac, also suspected of involvement in the 2004 intrigue against then-Minister Sarkozy, is legally protected with immunity, extending for the whole period of his Presidential tenure. Still, Sarkozy may initiate an investigation in episodes related to Chirac's earlier capacity of the Mayor of Paris. For this purpose, Chirac's longtime foes from the Socialist party, who once accused him of embezzlement of municipal funds in the interests of his party, are perfectly instrumental.
The persecution of Jacque Chirac is unfolding according to the scenario of the earlier ostracism of Helmut Kohl. Immediately after the end of the Mr. Kohl's 16-year tenure in the position of Germany's General Chancellor, he was accused of illegal funding of the election campaign of the Christian Democratic Union (CDU). Kohl was suspected of having illegally received a sum of $2 million for relevant purposes. After Mr. Kohl refused to disclose the names of the party's unofficial sponsors, he was railroaded from the post of CDU's chairman. Angela Merkel, who owed Kohl her successful party career, was excessively active in the campaign against her prostrate boss.
Eventually, a once greatly influential German politician, whose role in Germany's reunification was indispensable, became a political castaway in a matter of months. Analysts believed that the strings of the anti-Kohl campaign were then pulled from the United States which was greatly interested in Kohl's withdrawal from the political scene.
A similar operation is going to be undertaken in France, where Chirac has become the first head of state in national history undergoing judicial persecution. He was already investigated on a number of "old Paris cases" in the status of a "principal witness" which is very close to the status of a suspect. During the interrogation, he called his personal lawyer in aid. Regardless from the outcome of the affair, it is evident that Chirac is deprived from further influence on the political process in France.
Thus, Chirac is going to share the fate of Helmut Kohl. Not only Sarkozy but also his political backers in Washington are interested in this outcome. Therefore, Sarkozy's ascent may now be qualified as a silent coup d'etat.
Formally, the Gaullists are still the ruling party. Actually, all of the top party figures, including also Alain Juppe, are deliberately sidelined, while the French foreign policy is controlled by a different camp. Bernard Kouchner, current Foreign Affairs Minister, is a Socialist, as well as the newly-elected IMF's Managing Director Dominique Strauss-Kahn. This shift reflects an essential change in French policy. Under Chirac, France was one of the key opponents of the United States on the international scene. The new French Government follows most of the US foreign policy directives.
The major effort is developing in the domain of public opinion. An intensively brainwashed French middleman is expected to believe that his former political idols were nothing but petty corruptionists, while those who could expose the real masterminds of the policy shift, are supposed to keep their mouths shut.
Number of shows: 1063
ENG 
