Former MEP Rachida Dati’s 2014 emails derided corruption allegations, which now form core of French trial

Former French MEP Rachida Dati is facing intense scrutiny following allegations she took lobbying money from French energy giant GDF Suez/Engie during her time at the European Parliament, on top of a separate investigation into her ties with French car maker Nissan-Renault. The 60-year-old, who was born to Arab parents and started out as a maid, is also a former French culture and justice minister, and now mayor of the affluent 7th arrondissement of Paris. But she is also wearing a police ankle-bracelet and faces four years in prison in ongoing trials into her ties with the French companies, which first hit the headlines in 2025. And back in 2014, when she sat in the European Parliament, on the benches of the centre-right European People’s Party (EPP) group, she threatened to sue EUobserver because we asked her about GDF Suez, which later changed its name to Engie, while deriding the corruption allegations against her as racist slurs. EUobserver has published below some of the related email correspondence for the sake of transparency: Dati email from 15 Apr 2014 “Rachida Dati will not hesitate to sue any media which will report such a defamatory statement,” her office also said in an email in 2015, after a German Green MEP, who was spearheading an ethics committee, said she was likely pocketing GDF Suez money. Dati email from 15 June 2015 The allegedly "defamatory statement" had been made by Gerald Häfner, a former German Green MEP, who had chaired the parliament’s advisory committee on the Code of Conduct. Häfner's supposedly offensive words were: To read this story, log in or subscribeEnjoy access to all articles and 25 years of archives, comment and gift articles. Become a subscriber for as low as €1,75 per week.Read without limitsAlready a subscriber? Login