Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne has obtained from justice the withdrawal of a passage from a biography which infringed her privacy, according to a judgment rendered on Friday. The Nanterre court ruled that this passage was “seriously detrimental to respect for the right to privacy” of the Prime Minister and was “only intended to arouse public curiosity about her alleged sexual orientation”. .
The book in question is The Secret, by journalist Bérengère Bonte, published on May 4 by Editions de l’Archipel. They will have to pay the Prime Minister 1 euro in damages and 2,000 euros in legal costs. Elisabeth Borne had taken the publisher to court so that he withdrew, in the event of reprinting and because of invasions of his private life, several passages from this book.
The passage on “anorexia” not deleted
The Prime Minister “does not want to submit to the tyranny of transparency, it is consistent with what she has always been, a discreet woman”, pleaded her lawyer at the end of May. The court did not accede to all of his requests. He explained in the judgment delivered on Friday that the deletion of certain other passages “would constitute a disproportionate restriction on freedom of expression”. Are concerned remarks on a supposed “anorexia” of Elisabeth Borne between 2012 and 2015.
The publishing house announced in a press release that it wanted to appeal. “This decision is only one step in a fight for the freedom to investigate which must be that of journalists,” she said. “My publisher@Ed_Archipel is appealing this half-hearted decision and is continuing this so important fight for the freedom to investigate and inform. Waiting for, Elisabeth Borne, the Secret remains in bookstores in its initial version until the stock runs out,” tweeted Bérengère Bonte.