Marine Le Pen has accused Emmanuel Macron of leaking a police report accusing her of corruption to damage her run as the far-right candidate in next year’s presidential elections, reports The Times.
The 98-page report from the police anti-corruption unit detailed the findings of a six-year investigation into the alleged fraudulent use of 6.8 million euros (£5.9 million) of European parliament funds by Le Pen, her father Jean-Marie and 15 other officials in the National Rally, previously named National Front.
Le Pen and the other accused “created an organised fraudulent system for embezzling European funds for their benefit through the employment of fictitious parliamentary assistants”, the report said.
Preliminary charges were brought against them in 2017 and Le Pen, 52, has dismissed the case as a political plot since the outset. Lawyers for the party have been fighting in the courts to avert a trial or ensure it is staged after next spring’s two-round elections.
After the findings appeared in Le Journal du Dimanche, Le Pen dismissed the centre-right newspaper as “the official organ of the Macron government”, saying it had “come out again with the same perennial story of parliamentary aides, as with every election”. She added: “There’s nothing new under the sun, except that there are good polling figures in sight.”