PARIS (AFP) - One of the longest-running legal affairs in France edged closer to a denouement, with the start of the trial of 12 former associates of the late Socialist president Francois Mitterrand in a phone-tapping scandal dating back 20 years.
Those charged with invasion of privacy include Renault chief Louis Schweitzer, cabinet director for Mitterrand's prime minister Laurent Fabius in the mid-1980s, and Christian Prouteau who was allegedly in charge of the anti-terrorist office at the Elysee palace where the bugging was carried out.
Among the others are Gilles Menage, Mitterrand's cabinet director between 1988 and 1992, and Michel Delebarre, cabinet director for former prime minister Pierre Mauroy. The rest are all alleged former members of the secret unit.
The scandal broke in 1993 when Liberation newspaper reported that the telephones of around 150 people - including journalists, lawyers and celebrities -- had been tapped from the Elysee palace between 1983 and 1986 with Mitterrand's full approval.
Among those put under surveillance were Edwy Plenel, now editorial chief at Le Monde newspaper, actress Carole Bouquet, and Jean-Edern Hallier, a writer who committed suicide in 1997.
According to the prosecution, Hallier was suspected of wanting to reveal the existence of Mitterrand's out-of-wedlock daughter Mazarine.
The investigation has been held up by successive attempts to have the evidence declared state secrets.
Menage, 61, and Prouteau, 60, after long hiding behind a secrecy defence, later admitted in front of a judge that they had ordered some of the phone taps, while claiming they were legitimate and stressing that they were following orders.
Mitterrand set up his secret anti-terrorist office in August 1982, just after a bomb killed nine people in Paris. Officials began the phone-tapping operation began the next year, using what the investigation said were specious pretexts for monitoring the president's personal enemies.
Revelation of the scandal at the end of Mitterrand's second term helped establish his reputation for intrigue and self-aggrandisement. It was a factor in the decision by a new generation of Socialists -- led by former prime minister Lionel Jospin -- to move out of his political shadow.
The principal charge of invasion of privacy can carry a one-year prison term and a 45,000-euro (58,000-dollar) fine.
The trial is excpeted to last until mid-February.
11/15/2004 - 06:05 GMT - AFP