Carla Bruni-Sarkozy has dismissed as "ridiculous" rumours about the state of her marriage to President Nicolas Sarkozy and played down talk of a plot to damage her husband.
Earlier this week prosecutors opened an investigation into the source of the rumours, which surfaced last month in an online blog and spread across the Internet and foreign media outlets.
"It's gained proportions that I find ridiculous," Bruni-Sarkozy told the French radio station Europe 1. "These rumours are insignificant for me and my husband. It's true we've been victims of rumours, it's true it's not very agreeable, and it's true that it has no importance for us at all."
At a news conference last month, Mr Sarkozy dismissed questions about the state of his marriage.
Ms Carla Bruni-Sarkozy's remarks, which she said were made on her own behalf and that of her husband, were a change in tactics and appeared aimed at defusing a row over the way the issue has been handled by Mr Sarkozy's office.
French media, which treated the initial gossip with great caution, have used a series of comments by close presidential advisers to revive the story, which has been given blanket coverage this week.
"It is the Elysee itself - the target of the rumour - that has set the machine off again through the highly authorised voice of the president's lawyer and one of his main communications advisers," the left-wing newspaper Liberation said in an editorial.
Communications adviser Pierre Charon and the president's lawyer Thierry Herzog set off a media storm this week by suggesting the rumours were the result of a conspiracy aimed at destabilising Mr Sarkozy's presidency.
But Ms Bruni-Sarkozy said the president had nothing to do with any investigation. "I do not consider that we are the victims of any plot," she said. "Rumours have always existed. There's no conspiracy, there's no vengeance, it doesn't concern us and we turned the page a long time ago."
Reuters