France’s 7.8-billion-euro sale to India in 2016 of 36 Dassault-built Rafale fighter jets, the subject of an ongoing French judicial investigation, is mired by suspected corruption involving politicians and industrialists. As Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who signed the deal, prepares to attend France’s Bastille Day celebrations as guest of honour, documents obtained by Mediapart reveal how Modi’s billionaire friend, Anil Ambani, boss of the Indian conglomerate Reliance Group, which was handed a lucrative contract as a condition of the Rafale sale, directly solicited the intervention of then economy minister Emmanuel Macron and finance minister Michel Sapin in a bid to escape a 151-million-euro tax claim against his French subsidiary. The tax adjustment was finally cut down to 6.6 million euros. Yann Philippin reports.
On Monday December 5th former French president Nicolas Sarkozy began an appeal hearing following his conviction for corruption in the so-called 'Paul Bismuth' or phone-tapping case. At the original trial the ex-head of state was given a jail sentence but has not served a single night in prison. Mediapart's legal affairs correspondent Michel Deléan explains why it is that French politicians who are convicted in corruption cases so very rarely serve jail time despite the heavy prison sentences that such offences can attract.
A joint investigation by The Sunday Times and the London-based Bureau of Investigative Journalism has reported that a group of Indian hackers were hired to spy on journalists and other individuals “who threatened to expose wrongdoing” over the awarding to Qatar of this year’s football World Cup. Among the “dozen” people reported to have been targeted are former UEFA president Michel Platini, French senator Nathalie Goulet, and Mediapart journalist Yann Philippin. Qatar denies any involvement in the hacking operation. Fabrice Arfi and Michaël Hajdenberg report.
Throughout December, Mediapart and its 11 partners in the journalistic consortium European Investigative Collaborations (EIC) have published a catalogue of revelations about the corrupt practices in football, including tax evasion and money-laundering on a vast scale, and involving some of the best-known players, managers and agents in the game. The disclosures came from documents supplied by the whistle-blowing platform Football Leaks, and expose a startling state of affairs on and off the pitch. At the end of this long series of reports, which have now prompted a judicial investigation in France, Michael Hajdenberg, Michel Henry, Yann Philippin summarise the principal findings of the EIC and review the surprisingly timid reactions of the regulating authorities of the world’s most popular sport.
Football has become a new playing field for financial institutions preying on debt, as illustrated by documents from the whistle-blowing platform Football Leaks and analysed by the European journalistic consortium European Investigative Collaborations (EIC), in which Mediapart is a founding member. In one example, a British company called XXIII Capital had bought up 73 million dollars’ worth of debts resulting from transfers of players in England, France, Italy, Spain and Portugal. These were then included in a financial product offered on Wall Street and subsequently on the stock exchange of the Caribbean tax haven of the Cayman Islands. Michael Hajdenberg, Michel Henry and Yann Philippin report.
