J'ai rejoint Mediapart en mai 2011, après avoir été été journaliste à Libération de 1994 à 2011.
J'ai publié: L'assassin qu'il fallait sauver (Robert Laffont, 2025), De la part du Calife (Robert Laffont, 2021), Avec les compliments du Guide (avec Fabrice Arfi, Fayard, 2017), Les cartels du lait (avec Elsa Casalegno, Editions Don Quichotte, 2016), La Mémoire du plomb (Stock, 2012), Le Vrai Canard (avec Laurent Valdiguié, Stock, 2008, réédité en Points Seuil, 2010), Putsch au PS (collectif Victor Noir, Denoël, 2007), Machinations (avec Laurent Valdiguié, Denoël, 2006, réédité chez Pocket), Nicolas Sarkozy ou le destin de Brutus (collectif Victor Noir, Denoël, 2005), Des coffres si bien garnis, enquête sur les serviteurs de l'État-voyou (Denoël, 2004), Ils se croyaient intouchables (Albin Michel, 2000), Le banquier noir (Seuil, 1996).
Declaration of interest
In the interest of transparency towards its readers, Mediapart’s journalists fill out and make public since 2018 a declaration of interests on the model of the one filled out by members of parliament and senior civil servants with the High Authority for Transparency and Public Life (HATVP), a body created in 2014 after Mediapart’s revelations on the Cahuzac affair.
The Swiss authorities on Tuesday confirmed Mediapart’s exclusive report that a former HSBC employee who exposed tens of thousands of tax-evading accounts held with the bank has been arrested in Spain pending extradition to Switzerland, where he is wanted for breaching banking secrecy. But the extradition for trial of Hervé Falciani, 40, a former Geneva-based IT engineer for HSBC who holds dual French and Italian nationality, could lead to a far larger, wide-ranging scandal of major repercussions. For it is unknown whether he has kept hidden copies of his files of 127,000 accounts held with HSBC, which the French authorities are accused of having previously suppressed. The multi-billion-dollar question is whether the Swiss would finally allow his evidence to emerge in public.Valentine Oberti and Karl Laske report on the web of intrigue surrounding Falciani and the British bank which was last week slammed by a US Senate investigation for having served as a money-laundering conduit for "drug kingpins and rogue nations".
Barclays bank agreed a multi-million-euro loan to a Lebanese arms dealer now at the centre of a major French political corruption scandal despite its knowledge that his vast personal fortune was hidden from the tax authorities in money-laundering offshore companies, Mediapart can reveal. In a confidential document revealed here, a senior manager with the bank's private client arm, Barclays Wealth, recommended the 13.6 million-euro loan with the avowed aim of using Ziad Takieddine (pictured) to help Barclays further its activities with the now-deposed regime of Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi. Fabrice Arfi and Karl Laske report.
A friend and ally of far-right Front National leader Marine Le Pen has been investigated by the fraud squad over his business dealings. No prosecution took place but the investigation did unveil the financial links between Frédéric Chatillon – whose firm helped Le Pen's recent presidential election campaign - and the Syrian regime of Bashar al-Assad. For his part Chatillon claims the top secret investigation was politically motivated. Karl Laske and Marine Turchi report.
After former Libyan Prime Minister al-Baghdadi al-Mahmoudi was extradited back to Libya last weekend there has been growing concern for his welfare. His local lawyers say they have not been able to contact him since Sunday. Lawyers acting for Mediapart have now asked the French authorities to ensure that a French judge can interview him in Tripoli about the funding of Nicolas Sarkozy's 2007 election campaign by the regime of Colonel Muammar Gaddafi. Fabrice Arfi and Karl Laske report.
Trois jours après l’extradition de l’ancien premier ministre libyen, les avocats de Mediapart ont demandé au procureur de la République de Paris, que la justice française procède à son « audition », à Tripoli, sur les soupçons de financements occultes de Nicolas Sarkozy. En Libye, les avocats de Baghdadi n'arrivent plus à le joindre depuis dimanche.
Ex-Libyan Prime Minister al-Baghdadi al-Mahmoudi was controversially extradited to Libya from Tunisia just two days after offering to “reveal all” to a judge who is investigating allegations of illegal funding of election campaigns in France. Lawyers claim that Mahmoudi, who has already confirmed that the Libyan regime regime under Colonel Muammar Gaddafi provided 50 million euros for Nicolas Sarkozy's 2007 presidential campaign, has been beaten during interrogation since his return.
Extradé en Libye dimanche par le gouvernement tunisien, l'ancien premier ministre Baghdadi Ali al-Mahmoudi avait pris contact via son avocat, vendredi, avec le juge de l’affaire Takieddine. « Il allait être amené à parler des financements des campagnes électorales et des questions d’enrichissement personnel », explique son avocat, Me Ceccaldi, à Mediapart.
A transcription of a conversation between the late Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi and Nicolas Sarkozy, the first held by the two men following Sarkozy’s election as president in May 2007, reveals that, contrary to recent denials by the outgoing French head of state, Tripoli was offered French cooperation to develop a nuclear power programme, along with sales of weapons and security systems. The document, exclusively revealed here by Mediapart, also contains an exchange between the two leaders to decide with which Libyan official Sarkozy could discuss what he described as “delicate questions”. Gaddafi confirmed Sarkozy’s suggestion that this should be Bashir Saleh, head of the Libyan African Portfolio sovereign wealth investment fund who is named in a separate document published by Mediapart as the paymaster for the secret Libyan funding of Sarkozy’s 2007 election campaign. Fabrice Arfi and Karl Laske report.
Former Libyan Prime Minister al-Baghdadi al-Mahmoudi has confirmed that the regime of Colonel Muammar Gaddafi secretly provided 50 million euros for Nicolas Sarkozy’s 2007 election campaign. “We took part in Mr Sarkozy’s success and in the financing of his 2007 presidential campaign,” Mahmoudi said in an interview with Mediapart, conducted through his lawyer. "The figure of 50 million euros is correct.” Mahmoudi’s confirmation follows the publication by Mediapart of a December 2006 document, signed by the then head of Libya's foreign intelligence agency, Moussa Koussa, detailing how the Gaddafi regime agreed to “support the electoral campaign” of Sarkozy for the “sum of fifty million euros”, while the secret payments were to pass via the Libyan African Portfolio, a sovereign wealth investment fund. Fabrice Arfi and Karl Laske report.
Mediapart can reveal compelling new evidence that President Nicolas Sarkozy's successful 2007 election campaign was partly funded by former Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi. A document signed by a senior figure in Libya in 2006 and recently obtained by Mediapart states that the regime approved a payment of 50 million euros to back Sarkozy's campaign, following a meeting with one of his most trusted political allies. The explosive revelation is certain to fuel calls for a full-scale enquiry into the funding of the president's last election campaign. Fabrice Arfi and Karl Laske report.
A Paris judge investigating the suspected illegal financing of former French Prime Minister Edouard Balladur’s presidential election campaign has uncovered new and compelling evidence that he received a significant sum of cash siphoned off from a weapons deal with Saudi Arabia, Mediapart can reveal. The discovery, a major development in what has become known as 'the Karachi Affair', centres on cash withdrawn from a Swiss bank account belonging to a member of Kuwait’s ruling Al-Sabah family, Sheik Ibrahim Al-Duaij Al-Sabah. Fabrice Arfi and Karl Laske report.
After providing Mediapart with further information concerning allegations that President Nicolas Sarkozy’s 2007 election campaign was partly funded by former Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi, the man at the centre of the controversy has now suddenly denounced a “crude manipulation” of his secret report detailing the alleged scam. Jean-Charles Brisard, a French expert on terrorism and terrorist financing, had earlier told Mediapart how Brice Hortefeux, (pictured with arms dealer Ziad Takieddine) a longstanding close friend and political aide of the French president and who is now vice-president of France’s ruling UMP party, was the “front” in a financial network set up for the secret funding of Sarkozy’s 2007 election campaign by the Gaddafi regime. The Swiss-based consultant said he had a file containing “precise amounts, names, countries and dates.” Fabrice Arfi and Karl Laske report.
