Sawt Falasteen - France seeks probe after diplomat cited in Epstein files

The case around diplomat Fabrice Aidan, who has rejected all the charges, is the latest to shake France in the fallout following the US Department of Justice's release last month of new Epstein investigation files.

"When I learnt about it, I was appalled," Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot on Wednesday told the RTL broadcaster.

In an X post late on Tuesday, he said he was referring allegations against Aidan to the public prosecutor, and launching an internal inquiry into the "foreign affairs secretary on leave for personal reasons and holding positions in the private sector".

Epstein killed himself in prison in 2019 while facing charges of sex trafficking underage girls.

A mere mention in the files from the investigation into the disgraced New York financier does not imply wrongdoing.

An AFP search of the files showed Aidan exchanged emails with Epstein from 2010, when the Frenchman was, according to French media reports, working for the New York-based United Nations.

Some of the emails appear to show Aidan sending UN documents and reports to Epstein, who in 2008 pleaded guilty to procuring a child for prostitution and served 13 months of an 18-month sentence.

In a 2016 email, Epstein sent Aidan a link to a blog post about the United Nations firing a "young French diplomat" after an FBI probe in 2013 showed he had consulted child sex abuse websites.

News website 20minutes and investigative website Mediapart both on Tuesday reported several sources as saying that man was Aidan.

The diplomat's attorney Jade Dousselin said the accusations were "utterly false".

"There was never any consultation of child pornography sites. The FBI has already investigated without any charges ever being brought, and the investigations conducted in France reached the same conclusion," she said.

Gerard Araud, France's representative to the United Nations at the time, earlier told AFP that he "was informed by the United Nations security service that the FBI had sent them a report stating that Mr Aidan had accessed child pornography websites".

This report showed "repeated consultations" of these sites, Araud added.

"I immediately called Paris and ordered Mr Aidan to be sent back to France," he said.

- Norwegian ex-boss -

Aidan had worked at the United Nations from 2006 to 2013.

According to Araud, Aidan was during his time there an aide to Norway's Terje Rod-Larsen, who was a special envoy to the UN secretary-general part time from 2005 to 2016.

Rod-Larsen and his wife Mona Juul, who both played key roles in Israeli-Palestinian negotiations that led to the Oslo Accords of the early 1990s, are being investigated over their ties to Epstein in Norway, police there said on Monday.

After UN headquarters in New York, Aidan went on to work for the UN cultural agency UNESCO.

Energy group Engie, for whom he had been working more recently, told AFP on Tuesday it had let him go.

"In light of the information brought to our attention and reported in certain media, which would concern a period prior to his joining the group, Engie has decided to relieve Fabrice Aidan from his duties," it said.

The latest release of Epstein files has led to French former minister Jack Lang resigning from his position as the head of a top cultural body, the Arab World Institute.

Lang has however denied any wrongdoing, saying he was "shocked" that his name appeared in the statutes of an offshore company Epstein founded in 2016.

Lang's daughter Caroline, who allegedly owned half the shares in the company, has resigned from two positions.

I.Matar--SF-PST