PARIS — A French court has ordered Christine Lagarde, the managing director of the International Monetary Fund, to appear at a hearing next month connected to an investigation of her handling of a financial scandal when she was the French finance minister.
On Thursday, Ms. Lagarde’s lawyer confirmed the court summons, which was first reported late Wednesday by the news Web site Mediapart.
The investigation, which has included a police raid of Ms. Lagarde’s Paris apartment last month, concerns her decision in 2007 to refer to an arbitration panel a decades-old dispute between a wealthy friend of France’s president at the time, Nicolas Sarkozy, and the state-owned bank Crédit Lyonnais. The panel ultimately brokered a settlement that awarded the Sarkozy friend, Bernard Tapie, the flamboyant former owner of the Olympique Marseille soccer team, about $580 million, including interest.
The court’s summons of Ms. Lagarde could lead to the opening of a formal investigation of her role in the affair. But in France, being placed under formal investigation does not necessarily lead to charges and does not imply a presumption of guilt.
Ms. Lagarde has repeatedly denied any wrongdoing in the Tapie matter and has expressed her willingness to cooperate with the investigation.
Asked about the Tapie affair at a news conference at the opening of the World Bank and I.M.F. spring meetings, Ms. Lagarde said that she had known of the possibility of being interviewed by the investigative commission since 2011.
“There is nothing new under the sun,” Ms. Lagarde said, dismissing any concerns about the investigation or its bearing on her position at the head of the fund. “I will be very happy to travel for a couple days to Paris,” she said, adding that it would not change her focus or attention on her job. “I look forward to it.”
In a statement Thursday, Ms. Lagarde’s lawyer, Yves Repiquet, said the Court of Justice of the Republic — a special court that investigates allegations of misconduct by government ministers — had scheduled a hearing for the end of May, although he did not indicate a precise date.
“This hearing will be Mrs. Lagarde’s first opportunity to provide the investigative commission with information that will demonstrate that there is no basis to find fault with her actions,” Mr. Repiquet said.
A spokesman for the court did not respond to a request for comment.
The court is seeking to determine whether Ms. Lagarde was complicit in the misuse of public money in what critics say was an overly generous arbitration award to Mr. Tapie, a former Socialist politician who switched allegiance in 2007 to support Mr. Sarkozy’s center-right party, Union for a Popular Movement.
The dispute involved a loan of 1.6 billion French francs that Mr. Tapie that took out from Crédit Lyonnais to buy the distressed Adidas sports empire in 1989. Unable to keep up with the interest payments, Mr. Tapie converted his bank debt into shares of Adidas, which Crédit Lyonnais later sold in 1993 for more than the value of the loan. Mr. Tapie accused the bank of cheating him.
Mr. Sarkozy, when he became president in 2007, suggested that the Finance Ministry — which had been overseeing the dispute and was led by Ms. Lagarde — move the case to arbitration.
In a French television interview in January, Ms. Lagarde said that referring the dispute to arbitrators was “the best solution at the time.”
The I.M.F. has until now declined to comment on the French case, although officials have said the fund’s board was aware of the possibility of French legal proceedings against Ms. Lagarde before its decision to appoint her as managing director in 2011. Ms. Lagarde requested at the time that her right to diplomatic immunity in the case be waived to allow her to participate in her defense.
Annie Lowrey contributed reporting from Washington.
Article source: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/19/business/global/french-court-orders-lagarde-to-appear-in-tapie-case.html?partner=rss&emc=rss