The former Minister of Health, Agnès Buzyn, who had resigned in mid-February 2020 at the start of the Covid-19 epidemic, is summoned this Friday before the Court of Justice of the Republic (CJR) for a possible setting under review on its management of the pandemic, announced a judicial source on Thursday,
confirming information from World.
This summons to the CJR, the only jurisdiction empowered to judge ministers in the exercise of their function, takes place as part of the investigation carried out since July 2020 on how the government has managed this epidemic.
Agnès Buzyn defends herself
At the end of this hearing, Agnès Buzyn can be indicted or emerge under the more favorable status of assisted witness, if she manages to convince the judges that there are not enough serious or concordant clues that can be retained. against her. She had left the government in mid-February 2020 to run, in vain, for mayor of Paris, and had been replaced by Olivier Véran.
The ex-minister created an uproar by calling the municipal elections a “masquerade” and by declaring that she “knew that the tsunami wave was before us” when she left the ministry in mid- February. However, in January, she had publicly declared: “The risks of the spread of the coronavirus in the population are very low”, acknowledging that this analysis could “evolve”. Before the National Assembly’s commission of inquiry on the management of the health crisis, Agnès Buzyn indicated at the end of June 2020 that she had alerted the Elysee and Matignon in January of the same year on the potential “danger” of the coronavirus.
Nearly 15,000 complaints about the management of the epidemic
The investigation was opened in July 2020 after the CJR’s complaints commission, made up of senior judges, found that nine complaints against the executive were admissible. Since then, other complaints have been deemed admissible and joined to the investigation. The investigating commission of the CJR had been seized of the only offense of “abstaining from fighting a disaster” but, according to The world, Agnès Buzyn is also summoned Friday for a possible indictment for “endangering the life of others”.
On Wednesday, the Attorney General at the Court of Cassation François Molins, who represents the prosecution at the CJR, declared that “14,500 complaints” on the management of the pandemic had reached the CJR. Parisian investigating judges are carrying out a parallel investigation, this time focusing on the administration’s management of this crisis.