While Jack Lang said goodbye to the Arab World Institute (IMA) in Paris on Monday morning, searches took place there, as well as at his home, against a backdrop of alleged financial links between the former figure of the French left and the American sex criminal. “I am delighted because I have nothing to hide,” reacted the former Minister of Culture.

Published on: 02/16/2026 - 12:05 Modified on: 02/16/2026 - 19:03

Searches were launched on Monday February 16 in various locations, including the Arab World Institute (IMA) in Paris, as part of the investigation targeting Jack Lang for his alleged financial links with Jeffrey Epstein, said Pascal Prache, head of the National Financial Prosecutor's Office (PNF), in a press release.

The PNF opened an investigation on February 6 for suspicion of “laundering of aggravated tax fraud” targeting the former minister and his daughter, Caroline Lang.

If no charges are weighed at this stage against Jack Lang, who recently left the head of the IMA under pressure, the documents made public by the American justice system mention his name 673 times in exchanges with Jeffrey Epstein, and reveal links of interest with the American sexual and financial criminal.

See alsoEpstein affair: Pandora’s box? Let's talk about it with K. Gorjestani, H. Frade and P. Gervais

“Nothing to hide”

These searches took place while Jack Lang was bidding farewell to IMA staff during a small ceremony.

“Together, we have accomplished great things,” he said in front of around a hundred employees and relatives. “Without you (...), the IMA would not have regained its glory,” he also told the audience, which included the writer Erik Orsenna and the historian Benjamin Stora.

Questioned by AFP, he welcomed the searches carried out as part of investigations entrusted to the National Anti-Fraud Office (Onaf). “I am delighted because I have nothing to hide,” assured the resigning president of the IMA, who said goodbye on Monday to this institution that he led for 13 years.

According to an investigation published on February 2 by Mediapart, Caroline Lang founded in 2016 with Jeffrey Epstein an offshore company domiciled in the American Virgin Islands. Following these revelations, she immediately resigned from her position as general delegate of the Independent Production Union (SPI).

Caroline Lang described Jeffrey Epstein as an “acquaintance” and a “generous patron”, whose “idea of ​​establishing a perfectly legal fund intended to promote the acquisition of works” seemed “relevant” to her. She also assured that she had received “no remuneration or any profit from this fund”.

Emmanuel Macron's services had asked the 86-year-old former socialist minister to "think about the institution" he headed, after the revelations of the files published in the United States on January 30 on the Epstein affair. And the French government welcomed the resignation of Jack Lang from the presidency of the IMA after the opening of the PNF investigation.

A diplomat, a conductor and a modeling agent

Ex-figure of the French Socialist Party, the former Minister of Culture, famous in particular for having launched in the 1980s the concept of the Music Festival taken up by several countries, assured that the accusations made against him were "unfounded", in a press release sent to AFP.

The ramifications of the Epstein affair in France continue to move the lines of justice in France.

The Paris prosecutor's office announced this weekend that it had appointed lead magistrates to examine possible offenses involving French people and "completely" reanalyze the investigation file of the former modeling agent Jean-Luc Brunel, closed by a dismissal of the case after his death in detention in 2022.

To (re)readEpstein affair: Frenchman Jean-Luc Brunel, ex-top model agent, found dead

The prosecution stressed that the potential facts could be "of various natures, in particular of a sexual nature or of a financial nature", and assured to work "in coordination with the PNF and in conjunction with the national direction of the judicial police".

Three new cases cited in the press have been entrusted to the prosecution: they target a diplomat, Fabrice Aidan, a model recruiter, Daniel Siad, and the conductor Frédéric Chaslin.

Concerning Fabrice Aidan, an investigation seeks to possibly "support" a report sent by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, after revelations from Mediapart and Radio France according to which this diplomat had provided Jeffrey Epstein with "diplomatic information, services or his international networks".

See alsoGloria Origgi: “The Epstein affair will favor populist parties, critical of the elites”

The prosecution is also analyzing the complaint of a Swedish woman against Daniel Siad, a model recruiter with close links to Jeffrey Epstein, whom she accuses of rape in France in the 1990s. On social networks, the man assures that he has nothing to "reproach himself for".

The Paris prosecutor's office is examining another complaint filed against conductor Frédéric Chaslin for "acts of sexual harassment allegedly committed in 2016". He denounces “insinuations”.

With AFP

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