French President Emmanuel Macron has clarified feedback he made final yr about Gérard Depardieu which appeared to recommend his assist for the actor within the face of a tide of sexual assault accusations, which the latter has denied.
Speaking in an interview with French girls’s journal Elle, revealed on Wednesday, Macron steered his feedback had been misinterpreted and that he was not “complacent” concerning the points round sexual harassment and abuse.
“I just a want a respect for our principles, such as the presumption of innocence. These same principles which will allow justice to rule next October and that is a good thing.” he stated.
Depardieu is because of be tried in October on costs of sexual assault on two girls on a movie set in 2021, whereas accusations of sexual assault and rape by actress Charlotte Arnould are additionally making their approach by the courts.
In the backdrop a lot of different girls have accused Depardieu of sexual harassment and abuse. The actor has denied all of the allegations.
Macron drew criticism final December when he appeared to come back out in assist of Depardieu. The actor was in the course of a media storm on the time following the printed of an episode of investigative present Complément d’Enquete probing a number of sexual assault accusations towards the actor and different acts of inappropriate habits.
Talking on chat present C à Vous, the president steered Depardieu was the sufferer of “a manhunt”, including he was a “great admirer of Depardieu” and that the actor “had made France proud.”
In the identical interview, he additionally publicly dismissed then Culture Minister Rima Abdul Malak’s suggestion that Depardieu must be stripped of his Legion of Honor.
“I used the expression ‘manhunt’ in a gender-neutral way,” Macron advised Elle. I don’t like media trials, justice by tweets, and basically. We are in a society which seeks to kill individuals in a couple of days, after which forgets them.”
Macron stated his stance was “uncompromising” when it got here to tackling the problems of “rape”, “domination” and what he referred to as “this culture of brutality”.
“My priority has always been the protection of victims, and this is also the case for the Depardieu affair,” he stated.
Macron’s feedback and interview comes amid a contemporary #MeToo wave in France sparked by actress Judith Godrèche’s resolution to talk up about her underage relationship with Benoit Jacquot within the Eighties, when she was 14-years-old and he was 39-years-old.
Godrèche, who says she was underneath his affect and that the connection was flawed, filed a police criticism towards the Farewell, My Queen and Diary of a Chambermaid director in February for “rape with constraint”. He has denied the accusations.
Her actions and subsequent marketing campaign to finish a tradition of silence round harassment within the French movie enterprise have unleashed a wave of #MeToo allegations from throughout the cinema world in addition to different private and non-private walks of life.