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Jack Lang, a former French culture minister, has resigned as head of Paris’s prestigious Arab World Institute after revelations of his past contacts with the disgraced financier and sex offender Jeffrey Epstein and the launch of a financial investigation by French prosecutors.
Lang, 86, resigned on Saturday night before he was due to attend an urgent meeting called by the French foreign ministry to discuss his links to Epstein.
Earlier on Saturday, the rench financial prosecutor’s office opened an investigation into Jack Lang and his daughter, the film producer Caroline Lang, on suspicion of “aggravated tax fraud laundering” after they were referenced in the Epstein files. Both denied any wrongdoing.
Lang’s departure is the latest example of the fallout in Europe from files released on 30 January by the US Department of Justice, many of which showed Epstein’s social, networking and financial links. Lang is the most high-profile public figure in France caught up in the latest release of private messages from the convicted sex offender.
Lang was culture minister under the Socialist president François Mitterrand in the 1980s and 90s, and oversaw major modern architectural projects such as the building of the Louvre Pyramid. Since 2013, he has headed the Institut du Monde Arabe, or Arab World Institute, a cultural and research institution that promotes understanding of the Arab world and is supervised by the French foreign ministry.
Lang was shown in the Epstein files corresponding intermittently with the financier between 2012 and 2019, when Epstein died by suicide in jail.
Lang was mentioned more than 600 times in the files, according to news agencies. His daughter was also repeatedly mentioned.
Caroline Lang resigned this week from France’s Union of Independent Producers after the emails showed she had founded an offshore company with Epstein in 2016 to invest in the work of young artists. She said she had resigned from that offshore company when further allegations were made against Epstein in 2019. She denied any wrongdoing.
Caroline Lang also appeared in Epstein’s will as a beneficiary of €5m, according to the French investigative website Mediapart. She told the French public broadcaster France 2 this week that she had never heard of the will and had never seen any such document or received any funds.
Jack Lang has denied any wrongdoing, saying he was “shocked” that his name appeared in the statutes of the offshore company in 2016 and that he had appealed to Epstein only as a philanthropist.
Laurent Merlet, a lawyer for Jack and Caroline Lang, told Agence France-Presse: “There has been no movement of funds … But I think it is normal for the justice to want to verify this.” He said Caroline Lang was “serene” because she had received no funds.
In a defence used by other Epstein associates, Lang insisted he was unaware of Epstein’s criminal behaviour despite his conviction in 2008 for soliciting a minor for prostitution.
“How could a man so courteous, so charming, so generous have perpetrated such abominations?” Lang told the French public broadcaster, France 2, this week. He said he had been shocked to learn of the allegations against Epstein in 2019.
A video showed Lang with Epstein in front of the Louvre pyramid in Paris in March 2019, months before he was charged with sex trafficking girls as young as 14.
Le Monde newspaper and Mediapart, which investigated the files, said no documents released by the US justice department suggested either Lang or his daughter had been implicated in Epstein’s sex crimes.
Earlier this week, Lang had insisted he would not resign, despite calls for him to quit from all parties, including his own.
Lang has said he was introduced to Epstein by the American actor and director Woody Allen.
Epstein owned a vast apartment in the west of Paris and was a frequent visitor to the French capital before his death in prison in 2019.
