France’sforeign minister has requested a probe into a French diplomat who corresponded with convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, and who another envoy said was investigated while at the United Nations over child sex abuse websites.
The case around diplomat Fabrice Aidan 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 another 2016 email,Epsteinsent 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.
Source: Insider Paper
