LE POINT (France)
PARIS – Dominique Strauss-Kahn, the disgraced former leader of France’s Socialist Party and ex-head of the International Monetary Fund, has spent the past year trying to return the focus of attention to his economic acumen.
But no doubt, his first interview since September 2011, set to be published in French weekly Le Point on Thursday, is bound to get far more buzz. In extracts published Wednesday on Le Point’s website, DSK spoke mainly about his private travails, including his upcoming civil trial in New York City trial for damages for alleged rape, after the criminal case was shelved for lack of evidence.
“In the United States, they only have this kind of trial for people who are rich. The plaintiff’s lawyers thought I was, but I’m not.” (Strauss-Kahn’s wife Anne Sinclair, a French television star and heiress, after standing by him throughout the ordeal of his criminal trial, has now left him.)
DSK did express regret for his actions, calling his behavior, which included well-publicized visits to Paris’s “swinger” clubs, “naïve.”
“I thought I could lead my personal life as I wished…. That might be true for a CEO, a sports star or an artist, but not for a politician. My views on that were too different from those of French society for a political leader.”
He added that he was sorry to have caused disappointment to two different groups of French voters: those who were shocked to learn of his personal life, and those who were sad that because of it he lost his chance to be president of France. He plans to continue a career as a consultant to banks and investment funds.
