Several top directors attending the Cannes film festival have signed an on-line petition in support of Roman Polanski, currently under house arrest in Switzerland.
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The signatories include the Franco-Swiss director Jean-Luc Godard, and French directors Mathieu Amalric, Bernard Tavernier and Xavier Beauvois, all of whom have films officially selected for this year’s festival.
They call on the Swiss authorities to reject a United States request to extradite Polanski over a child sex case dating back to 1977.
The 76-year-old Franco-Polish filmmaker was detained under an international arrest warrant as he entered Switzerland last September, and is now under house arrest in his chalet in the Swiss resort of Gstaad.
The petition maintains that the US extradition request is “based upon a lie”. This echoes a claim made recently by Polanski’s lawyers who say that secret transcripts of testimony given by a prosecutor in the original case would show that the justice authorities in Los Angeles had provided false and incomplete information in their request to Switzerland.
Earlier this week, a Los Angeles judge refused a request to unseal the testimony.
In the wording of the petition, the signatories “appeal to the Swiss authorities, entreating them not to believe the word of Governor Schwarzenegger and the prosecutors of the state of California”.
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Polanski team lose bid to unseal transcript
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Lawyers for Polanski said the dossier contained secret transcripts of testimony by retired US Deputy District Attorney Roger Gunson which would prove the extradition request was based on false and incomplete statements by the Los Angeles district attorney’s office. Superior Court Judge Peter Espinoza said that the only circumstance in which the material would become…
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The Oscar winner is under house arrest at his chalet in Gstaad while awaiting possible extradition to the United States for sentencing in a child-sex case stemming from 1977. “Thirty-three years ago I pleaded guilty, served my sentence in a normal prison, not a VIP jail, which should have covered the entirety of my term.…
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The decision paves the way for his extradition but Swiss justice officials are waiting for further information from the US before deciding whether to carry out the extradition order. Polanski is wanted in California for sentencing, having fled the country for France three decades ago. The 76-year-old was picked up by Swiss authorities on an…
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The organisers said they wanted to recall Polanski’s immense talent as a director and his contribution to film history, rather than discuss the ins and outs of the ongoing legal case. But there was sharp criticism of the Swiss authorities over the director’s arrest. The arrest of Polanski in September was a bombshell that “shocked”…
You can find an overview of ongoing debates with our journalists here. Please join us!
If you want to start a conversation about a topic raised in this article or want to report factual errors, email us at english@swissinfo.ch.