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| International Monetary Fund Managing Director Dominique Strauss-Kahn, in an April |
Dominique Strauss-Kahn, International Monetary Fund chief and attainable contender for French presidency, charged with assault on hotel maid
NEW YORK - The leader of the International Monetary Fund plus a doable candidate for president of France was arrested in New York Sunday in connection together with the violent sexual assault of a hotel maid after getting yanked from a plane moments just before it was to depart, police said.
Dominique Strauss-Kahn, 62, was awaiting arraignment on charges of a criminal sex act, attempted rape and unlawful imprisonment. He had been taken off the Air France flight to Paris at John F. Kennedy International Airport on Saturday afternoon by officers from the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey and was turned more than to New York police, said Paul J. Browne, New York Police Department spokesman.
His lawyer, Benjamin Brafman, did not right away respond to telephone or email messages in search of comment from The Related Press. "We have not but been able to meet with our client and we may well have much more to say tomorrow," Brafman told The New York Times late Saturday.
France woke towards the bombshell news Sunday to surprise plus a degree of caution. On-line commentators questioned no matter if the incident could have been aspect of a smear campaign by the unpopular President Nicolas Sarkozy, whose political fortunes have already been flagging, against his main rival in the race for following year's presidential elections.
The incident could completely shake up the race for president next year, and throw the long-divided Socialists back into disarray about whom they could present as a challenger to Sarkozy.
"It's a cross that will be tough for him to bear," mentioned Dominique Paille, a political rival to Strauss-Kahn on the center left, on BFM television.
"It's entirely hallucinating. If it truly is true, this could be a historic moment, but inside the negative sense, for French political life," Paille mentioned. Nonetheless, he urged, "I hope that everyone respects the presumption of innocence. I can not manage to believe this affair."
The 32-year-old lady told authorities that she entered Strauss-Kahn's suite in the luxury Sofitel hotel not far from Manhattan's Occasions Square at about 1 p.m. Eastern time (1600 GMT) Saturday and he attacked her, Browne said. She stated she had been told to clean the spacious $3000-a-night-suite suite, which she had been told was empty.
According to an account the woman supplied to police, Strauss-Kahn emerged from the bathroom naked, chased her down a hallway and pulled her into a bedroom, where he began to sexually assault her. She mentioned she fought him off, then he dragged her into the bathroom, exactly where he forced her to carry out oral sex on him and attempted to take away her underwear. The woman was in a position to break totally free once more and escaped the room and told hotel staff what had happened, authorities mentioned. They referred to as police.
When detectives arrived moments later, Strauss-Kahn had currently left the hotel, leaving behind his cellphone, Browne stated. "It looked like he got out of there inside a hurry," Browne mentioned.
The NYPD found he was in the airport and contacted Port Authority officials, who plucked Strauss-Kahn from first class on the Air France flight that was just about to leave the gate.
The maid was taken by police to a hospital and was being treated for minor injuries. John Sheehan, a spokesman for the hotel, said its staff was cooperating inside the investigation.
Strauss-Kahn, a married father of 4, was briefly investigated in 2008 over no matter whether he had an improper romantic relationship having a subordinate female employee. The IMF board identified his actions "regrettable" and said they "reflected a really serious error of judgment."
Caroline Atkinson, an IMF spokeswoman, issued a statement Sunday that stated the agency would have no comment on the New York situation. She referred all inquiries to Strauss-Kahn's private lawyer and mentioned the "IMF remains completely functioning and operational."
Strauss-Kahn's offices in Paris couldn't be reached when the news broke overnight in France. One of his allies, Jean-Marie Le Guen, expressed doubt about the incident.
"The details as they've been reported these days have nothing to perform using the Dominique Strauss-Kahn that we know," Le Guen mentioned on BFM television. "Dominique Strauss-Kahn has never ever exhibited violence toward people close to him, to any individual."
Strauss-Kahn was supposed to be meeting in Berlin on Sunday with German Chancellor Angela Merkel about help to debt-laden Greece, after which joining EU finance ministers in Brussels on Monday and Tuesday. The IMF is accountable for one-third of Greece's current loan package, and his expected presence at these meetings underlined the gravity from the Greek crisis.
Strauss-Kahn took more than as head of the IMF in November 2007. The 187-nation lending agency is headquartered in Washington and delivers enable in the form of emergency loans for nations facing severe economic problems.
Strauss-Kahn won praise for his leadership in the IMF during the economic crisis of 2008 as well as the severe international recession that followed.
Far more recently, he has directed the IMF's participation in bailout efforts to help keep a European debt crisis that started in Greece from destabilizing the international economic system.
In October 2008, Strauss-Kahn issued an apology towards the IMF staff after accusations that he had a sexual romantic relationship with an IMF subordinate.
"While this incident constituted an error in judgment on my element, for which I take full responsibility, I firmly think that I've not abused my position," Strauss-Kahn wrote in an e-mail to IMF staff.
The board located that the relationship was consensual. The IMF employee left the fund and took a job with all the European Bank for Reconstruction and Improvement.
Ahead of taking the best post at the IMF, Strauss-Kahn had been a member from the French National Assembly and had also served as France's Minister of Economic system, Finance and Sector from June 1997 to November 1999.
He had been viewed as a top contender to run on the Socialist Party's ticket to challenge the re-election of French President Nicolas Sarkozy.
Strauss-Kahn, dubbed DSK in France, was witnessed as the strongest achievable challenger to Sarkozy in following year's presidential elections. Strauss-Kahn has not declared his candidacy, staying vague in interviews while feeding speculation that he wants France's best job.
French media have reported about Strauss-Kahn's life-style, like luxury automobiles and suits, that some have dubbed a smear campaign.
He sought the Socialist Party's endorsement within the last elections, in 2007, but came in second in a major to Segolene Royal. Royal, the first woman to acquire so close to France's presidency, lost to Sarkozy within the runoff.
After Sarkozy won, the new president championed Strauss-Kahn as a candidate to run the IMF. Sarkozy's backers touted the move as a sign from the conservative president's campaign of openness to leftists - but political strategists saw it as a way for Sarkozy to have a possible challenger far away from the French limelight.
Royal, who continues to harbor presidential ambitions of her own, remained prudent Sunday about the allegations, saying Strauss-Kahn has the best to the presumption of innocence.
"My thoughts visit the man in this difficult time and to his household," she mentioned. "We are inside a Democracy and must let justice do its perform. Everyone have to keep calm."
The international financial crisis thrust Strauss-Kahn into an unexpectedly prominent role and boosted his global standing in time to consider a 2012 French presidential bid.
A former economics professor, Strauss-Kahn joined the Socialist party in 1976 and was elected to parliament in 1986 from the Val-d'Oise district, north of Paris. He went on to become mayor of Sarcelles, a working-class immigrant suburb of Paris.
His to begin with government post was industry minister under former President Francois Mitterrand. As finance minister, he reduced France's debt repayments by way of a raft of privatizations which includes the sale of shares in France Telecom SA and Air France.
He is credited with preparing France for the adoption from the euro by taming its deficit and persuading then-Prime Minister Lionel Jospin to sign up to an EU pact of fiscal prudence
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