French admit ex-minister's aides bugged

Paris - The French Defence Ministry confirmed yesterday that it had ordered wire-taps on two senior aides to former Defence Minister Francois Leotard for unspecified "national security" reasons.

The statement was made after Le Monde reported that the surveillance was aimed at discovering whether cash from Saudi arms sales had been diverted to former Prime Minister Edouard Balladur's presidential campaign.

The disclosure gave a new dimension to scandals over alleged illegal political funding, including that of President Jacques Chirac's Gaullist party.

Prime Minister Alain Juppe and a special commission had approved the wire-taps, as required by law, it said. The commission which oversees wire-taps, headed by a member of France's highest administrative court, said the telephone interceptions were authorised within legal guidelines "which unambiguously exclude any political motives".

Mr Leotard was a senior organiser of Balladur's unsuccessful campaign for the 1995 presidential election, in which Chirac, a fellow Gaullist, defeated him. Le Monde said in a front-page story that Chirac's entourage had suspected that in 1993 and 1994, commissions on arms sales to Saudi Arabia, worth hundreds of millions of dollars, had gone to Balladur and his supporters.

Le Monde said at least three officials had been subject to wire-taps. It identified them as Francois Lepine, now regional prefect of the Franche- Comte area of eastern France, Patrice Molle, currently deputy chief of Leotard's personal staff, and Colonel Louis-Pierre Dillais.

Mr Dillais, an intelligence specialist in Mr Leotard's private office, is reported to have coordinated the sinking of the Greenpeace ship Rainbow Warrior in New Zealand in 1985. Le Monde said Mr Leotard's successor, Charles Millon, ordered the wire-taps after Chirac appointed him to succeed Leotard.

Mr Leotard commented: "I urge the Prime Minister to explain this practice, which is both astonishing and unjust towards military men or senior officials who have served their country honourably."