Sarkozy's Ex-wife Fails to Ban Book of Revelations

Nicolas Sarkozy's former wife, Cecilia, today lost a bid to block the publication of a book which quotes her describing the French president as a seducer, a skinflint and incapable of loving anyone, even his children.

The court threw out the complaint that the book, called Cecilia, violated the former first lady's private life, ruling that a ban "would be totally disproportionate, all the more so because the book is already on sale".

A lawyer for Cecilia Sarkozy said she would appeal the decision.

The biography, by journalist Anna Bitton, appeared in bookshops yesterday and quotes the former first lady as calling the president a "womanizer," "cheap" and "ridiculous".

In one passage, she is quoted as saying that Sarkozy's behaviour after her departure - a hotchpotch of women and "karaoke until 4am" - was not dignified. "He's not like a president, he has a real behavior problem."

Cecilia is one of three books coming out this week about the former first lady, who divorced the president in October after 11 years of marriage.

"The publishing avalanche could be the crowning of a French Lady Di," said the French magazine Le Nouvel Observateur. "Someone who has known the inner workings of power and comes back to destroy it with words."

The judge noted that Cecilia Sarkozy had discussed her relationship with her ex-husband in two interviews after her divorce, suggesting she was not seeking to keep her private life secret.

The author's lawyer, Christophe Bigot, argued that the Sarkozys had made their private life public as part of their effort to get him elected president.

He also insisted the book was not insulting to Cecilia Sarkozy, although it calls her a shopping addict who complains that her alimony payments are too low for her lifestyle.

She had known the journalist for a long time and treated her as a friend, said Jean-Yves Dupeux, a lawyer for the former first lady. He said the lawyers argued in court that the book went "beyond transgression of the intimacy of the private life of Madame Sarkozy".

The latest episode in the soap opera of the French president's private life came as the nation awaits his third marriage, to the former supermodel Carla Bruni.

Roger Karoutchi, secretary of state for parliamentary relations, yesterday defended the president and his ex-wife, saying she had denied making the comments. He said coverage of the president's private life was out of control. "We are now saying that he doesn't love his children," he said on French TV before the court action. "This is ridiculous. We have to stop."

Karoutchi stressed that Sarkozy had a close bond with his 10-year-old son Louis, born during his marriage to Cecilia. The president also has two sons, Pierre, 22, and Jean, 21, from his first marriage.

In 2005, an authorized biography on Cecilia Sarkozy was pulped after her husband, then the interior minister, summoned the publisher to his office.