Key points
- The allegations surfaced in 2023
- Hakimi was placed under police monitoring
- He was banned from contacting the alleged victim
ISLAMABAD: French prosecutors on Friday called for Paris Saint-Germain star Achraf Hakimi to face trial for the alleged rape of a woman in 2023, which the Moroccan international denies.
The Nanterre prosecutor’s office told the AFP news agency that they had requested that the investigating judge refer the rape charge to a criminal court.
“It is now up to the investigating magistrate to make a decision within the framework of his order,” the prosecutor’s office told AFP in a statement.
Police monitoring
According to Reuters, Hakimi was placed under police monitoring and was banned from contact with the alleged victim in March 2023.
Hakimi, 26, played a major role in PSG’s run to their first Champions League title, the full-back scoring the opener in the 5-0 rout of Inter Milan in the final in May.
Hakimi, who helped Morocco to their historic progress to the semi-finals of the 2022 World Cup, was charged in March 2023 with raping a 24-year-old woman.
Hakimi allegedly paid for his accuser to travel to his home on February 25, 2023, in the Paris suburb of Boulogne-Billancourt while his wife and children were away on holiday.
The woman went to a police station following the encounter, alleging rape and was questioned by police.
No formal accusation
Although the woman refused to make a formal accusation, prosecutors decided to press charges against the player.
She told police at the time that she had met Hakimi in January 2023 on Instagram.
On the night in question, she said she had travelled to his house in a taxi paid for by Hakimi. She told police Hakimi had started kissing her and making non-consensual sexual advances, before raping her, a police source told AFP at the time.
She said she managed to break free to text a friend who came to pick her up.
“Incomprehensible and senseless”
Contacted by AFP after Friday’s development, Hakimi’s lawyer Fanny Colin described the call by prosecutors for a trial as “incomprehensible and senseless in light of the case’s elements”.
“We, along with Achraf Hakimi, remain as calm as we were at the start of the proceedings.
