Mediapart has obtained the secret recordings made by Greece’s former finance minister Yanis Varoufakis during the 2015 negotiations at Eurogroup meetings on the proposed bailout conditions of the Greek debt. Selected audio extracts are presented here.
Mediapart has obtained access to secret sound recordings made by former Greek finance minister Yanis Varoufakis of his negotiations with eurozone finance ministers and representatives of the IMF, ECB and the European Commission at the height of the Greek debt crisis in 2015. The 15 hours of recordings offer a sometimes disturbing insight into the tense, closed-door, informal talks aimed at deciding the fate of a nation that was being brought to its knees. Ludovic Lamant reports.
Saudi Arabia has forged a major partnership with France to develop the huge site of Al Ula in the north-west of the country, an ancient area which is set to become a major tourist and cultural attraction. An exhibition about Al Ula is running at the Arab World Institute in Paris until March 8th. As Antoine Pecqueur reports, culture is becoming a geopolitical Trojan Horse for the Saudi Kingdom as it seeks to boost its international standing, with France as one of its key partners. Meanwhile French businesses are queuing up to get involved.
Two leading names in winemaking in the prestigious wine area of Saint-Émilion in the Bordeaux region of south-west France have been accused of an illegal conflict of interest. A judge sent Hubert de Boüard de Laforest and Philippe Castéja for trial over claims that they had helped set the rules over who could qualify as a top-ranking Saint-Émilion wine producer, rules from which they themselves benefited. However, in a new and unusual twist after many years of legal procedure, local prosecutors have appealed against the judge's decision to send the two influential men for trial. Mediapart's legal affairs correspondent Michel Deléan explains the background to the case.
Pascal Cotte, a French scientist who has written several studies and two books on the 'Mona Lisa', and who has digitised several works by Leonardo da Vinci, has accused the Louvre Museum of “parasitism” in relation to his work. Cotte claims that in its major exhibition on the artist, which ends on February 24th, the Paris museum has not credited his discoveries and ground-breaking work on the artist and his most famous painting. Karl Laske reports.
In January 2020 Thierry Gaubert, a former close aide to Nicolas Sarkozy, was arrested and then placed under formal investigation for “criminal conspiracy” in relation to claims that the former president's 2007 election campaign was funded with Libyan money. Gaubert is now free on bail, but banned from meeting with either Sarkozy or the ex-head of state's long-standing friend and ally Brice Hortefeux. As Fabrice Arfi and Karl Laske report, this move marks a major turning point in the long-running judge-led investigation.
Over several years, the French intelligence services gained vital information about the activities of the so-called Islamic State group thanks to a man who infiltrated its terrorist network. A Muslim who became a spy by chance, he risked his life by befriending jihadists, and notably helped to foil two planned terror attacks. Matthieu Suc reveals the story of an unsung hero, codenamed Abominor.
One of the key suspects in the marathon judicial probe into alleged funding of former French president Nicolas Sarkozy’s 2007 election campaign by the regime of late Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi was this weekend placed in preventive detention in France after losing a two-year legal battle to avoid his extradition from Britain. French judges have formally placed Alexandre Djouhri under investigation for nine alleged offences, including “active corruption”, aiding and abetting, and receiving, the proceeds of the “misappropriation of public funds”, “money laundering the proceeds of corruption”, “forgery and the use of forgeries” and “tax fraud”. Fabrice Arfi and Karl Laske report.
Key documents seen by Mediapart shed new light on the award of the 2022 football World Cup to Qatar. The documents, written to then French president Nicolas Sarkozy by his sports advisor, relate to a lunch that took place at the Élysée Palace in 2010, just days before the crucial vote to decide the tournament’s host country. They reveal that the then boss of European football ruling body UEFA, Michel Platini, had been “reluctant” to back the Gulf state, but had been convinced to switch his vote to it by the end of the meeting with the French president and key figures from Qatar. Yann Philippin and Antton Rouget report.
Former Renault chief executive and Nissan chairman Carlos Ghosn's secret escape from Japan on December 29th, when he was allegedly smuggled out of the country in a musical instrument box by hired former special services veterans, was as dramatic as his arrest there one year earlier on charges of serious financial misconduct. But the manner of his flight bore all the hallmarks of the use over two decades by the one-time titan of the world’s carmaking industry of private security personnel, both to spy on his staff but also shareholders and board members. Mediapart's Matthieu Suc, author of a recent book detailing Ghosn’s seeming obsession with surveillance, reports.
