The threat to Nicolas Sarkozy's re-election bid from corruption scandals intensified on Wednesday after a leading state prosecutor close to the president was summoned before judges over an alleged dirty tricks campaign to spy on journalists.
Seven months before the presidential election, Sarkozy, who once promised to be Mr Squeaky Clean of French politics, has seen his close circle come under pressure in a series of corruption investigations whose plots thicken by the day. Investigators are untangling a web of scandals involving alleged illegal party-funding with banknotes variously stuffed into bags, briefcases and brown envelopes, as well as phone interceptions.
As the beleaguered president unveiled his austerity budget on Wednesday, his government was waging a public relations war to try to dampen the talk of sleaze and to stress that Sarkozy himself had not been personally implicated.
But with his closest allies being dragged into investigations, questions were being raised over Sarkozy's role. Coupled with the humiliating political defeat of the senate falling to the left for the first time in more than 50 years, voices in Sarkozy's own ruling party even began to question whether he was the best candidate to stand for the right in the 2012 presidential race.
The latest scandal involves an alleged "cabinet noir", or office of shady operations, at the highest reaches of the state after Le Monde complained that the secret services had spied on its journalists to uncover their sources.
French state intelligence agencies are accused of illegally obtaining detailed phone records of every call and movement of Le Monde's investigations editor Gérard Davet in order to uncover his source on a story about the Bettencourt affair - the family saga which exploded into a series of tax-evasion and illegal party funding scandals that were extremely damaging to the French right.
The source of one story was uncovered as an official in the justice ministry and was swiftly demoted by the government and posted to French Guiana. Le Monde claims two other journalists' phone records were illegally obtained.
The episode was seen as an attempt by the highest echelons of the French state to lean on the media and its sources and scare them into silence. Opposition Socialists are demanding an independent commission examine whether the president's circle used state intelligence agencies to try to limit the damage to the ruling right UMP party from the growing Bettencourt scandal.
Le Monde reported on Wednesday that the magistrate and French state prosecutor, Philippe Courroye, seen as close to Sarkozy, was to be interviewed by a Paris judge as part of the investigation into the spying scandal. The paper said a judge had written to Courroye to summon him for questioning and warn him he could be charged in the case. If so, it would a first in French legal history.
The case threatens to raise questions about the president's influence over state prosecutors.
Courroye issued a statement dismissing all allegations and saying he was outraged by the "calumny" against him. He has denied being too close to Sarkozy. The president decorated him with an honour in 2009 and announced they were friends.
Two other key figures of Sarkozy's circle, the head of the secret services, Bernard Squarcini, and chief of police, Frédéric Péchenard, are also to be summoned as witnesses by the judge investigating spying on journalists.
The spying saga - described by one magazine editor as evidence of France's "banana republic" - is the latest in a bewildering array of corruption investigations to hit the right.
The Bettencourt affair continues to damage Sarkozy's ruling UMP party. One inquiry is focused on whether Sarkozy or his party members took brown envelopes of cash from the billionaire L'Oréal shampoo heiress Liliane Bettencourt for illegal party funding. Bettencourt's former accountant told Liberation on Wednesday that the elderly widow handed Sarkozy's party treasurer 50,000 euros in cash five months before the 2007 presidential election.
In another affair known as "Karachigate", two of the president's closest friends, including his best man at his marriage to Carla Bruni, have been charged by judges investigating alleged kickbacks on arms sales to Pakistan in the 1990s. Judges are examining whether kickbacks illegally funded the presidential campaign of Sarkozy's mentor, former rightwing prime minister Édouard Balladur.
The former interior minister Brice Hortefeux, Sarkozy's oldest friend, faces a legal complaint for leaning on witnesses after he was recorded calling one of Sarkozy's allies who has been charged the Karachi case and warned him that his estranged wife had been "blabbing" too much to investigators. Hortefeux has counter-sued for defamation, denying the charges.
The scandals facing Sarkozy
The Bettencourt affair: An investigation into whether the billionaire L'Oréal heiress handed envelopes of cash to Sarkozy's treasurer, party members or even Sarkozy himself to illegally fund his previous presidential campaign. Allegations that the Élysée leant on the judiciary to try to stifle the affair. Eric Woerth, Sarkozy's treasurer and former budget minister, denies involvement.
Karachigate: Allegations that kickbacks from French arms sales to Pakistan in the early 1990s secretly funded the failed presidential campaign of Sarkozy's mentor Édouard Balladur. Sarkozy was his campaign spokesman. Sarkozy's office said he had nothing to do with the case.
The Lagarde-Tapie affair: Former finance minister Christine Lagarde is under investigation for a 285m euro arbitration deal in favour of the controversial tycoon and Sarkozy ally Bernard Tapie. Did Sarkozy order the deal and did he personally benefit? The government spokeswoman said justice should be allowed to take its course and the presumption of innocence respected.
Briefcases of African cash: An Africa expert close to Sarkozy claimed the former president Jacques Chirac and his prime minister Dominique de Villepin received briefcases of banknotes from African leaders to fund party politics. Others suggest this practise continued under Sarkozy. The interior minister said allegations against Sarkozy were "scandalous".
Comment: Something tells us these scandals are just the tip of the iceberg.