Former International Monetary Fund Director Dominique Strauss-Kahn on Sunday gave his first interview since being cleared of sexual assault, during which he apologized for his "moral failure" in a scandal involving a sexual encounter with a New York City hotel maid. Speaking on French television channel TF1, Strauss-Kahn described his May 14 encounter with the maid, Nafissatou Diallo, who later accused him of rape. "It did not involve violence, constraint or aggression," he said. Strauss-Kahn was cleared of sexual assault charges on Aug. 23 three months after Diallo accused him of raping her when she came to clean his suite at New York's Sofitel hotel. Prior to the scandal, Strauss-Kahn had been considered a frontrunner in the upcoming French presidential elections as well as a favorite for the position of director-general of the IMF. But the court proceedings led him to resign his IMF post and fall out of favor with the French public. "It was a moral failure, I am not proud of it, " he admitted. "I regret it infinitely, and have regretted it every day for the past four months. I think I am still not done regretting it," he said. Strauss-Kahn continued to lament failing his "wife, children, and friends, but also failing vis-a-vis the French people, who had vested their hopes for change in me ... I've seen the pain that I caused around me and I thought [about it], I thought a lot." Strauss-Kahn's case caused a media frenzy, with one tabloid running a full-page photograph of Strauss-Kahn on its front cover under the heading of "Le Perv." Strauss-Kahn said he felt "trampled on, humiliated, even before I had the chance to say a word." Strauss-Kahn was widely perceived as guilty even before justice had run its course. During a forum on Israel and the Arab Spring at Tel Aviv University in July, MK Tzipi Livni called out Strauss-Kahn's longtime friend, French philosopher Bernard-Henry Levi, for standing behind Strauss-Kahn, a move which in her words constituted "supporting something that is immoral and wrong." Levi responded to Livni's comment, saying, "I believe in innocent until proven guilty. If Strauss-Kahn is proven guilty, then he should be punished, perhaps even more so than the common man. He is a dear friend of mine, and I know him well. I said I cannot imagine him doing such things. I personally do not know. I am neither a police officer nor a judge, in contrast to the newspapers, who do view themselves as such." Regarding his case, Strauss-Kahn said that the New York prosecutor concluded the maid had "lied about everything," and subsequently dropped all charges against him. According to the prosecutor, the maid had "so many versions of everything you could not believe a word." During the interview, Strauss-Kahn also maintained his innocence in a different legal dispute between himself and a French journalist who accused him of trying to rape her during a 2003 interview she conducted with him for a book she was writing. Strauss-Kahn said he will return to politics in due course, as we he wishes to have "time to reflect" before making his next decision. During the interview, Strauss-Kahn praised the way his wife stood beside him during the trial. "She is an exceptional woman," he said, adding, "I would not have gotten through it without her." Strauss-Kahn said he was sure his wife would not have supported him had she not believed he was innocent.
