Last update - 00:00 07/09/2006
President's Residence: Katsav doesn't plan to step down over sex probe
By Gideon Alon and Jonathan Lis, Haaretz Correspondents, and Haaretz Service
Sources in the President's Residence said Friday that President Moshe Katsav does not plan to step down, despite the Knesset legal counselor's statement urging him to do so in response to a sexual harassment investigation.
Knesset legal councilor Nurit Elstein called on Katsav on Thursday to tell the Knesset House Committee that he is temporarily unable to perform his duties due to charges that he sexually harassed women who have worked for him.
If the president agrees to the move, the committee can convene next week and approve a leave of absence of up to three months.
However, sources close to Katsav said he had no intention of giving up the presidency and accused the media of treating him unjustly, Israel Radio reported. The sources said Katsav should be presumed innocent and would continue his regular routine. He is scheduled to meet with the president of Poland next week.
Meanwhile, Kadima MK Ruhama Avraham, who leads the House Committee, joined Elstein and also called on the president to temporarily step aside.
Katsav will not preside over the swearing-in of Dorit Beinisch as the new Supreme Court President next week, as police question him Thursday for a fourth time on suspicion of sexually abusing female employees.
Katsav's decision to skip the ceremony presents a legal problem, in that according to the Basic Law, a justice must be appointed in the presence of the state president. Katsav will be required to inform his replacement, Knesset Speaker Dalia Itzik, formally of his decision to take vacation on the day of the appointment.
The President's Residence said in a statement that the Katsav would refrain from attending in order "to prevent arguments tied to the event," adding that Katsav felt it would be inappropriate to faciliate the ceremony at the present time.
The president saw himself as the "victim of slander" according to the statement, by his former employee who was trying "to build her defense with despicable lies about him."
Katsav was questioned also on Wednesday in an investigation that focused for the first time on the complaints and testimony of women who claimed the president had sexually abused them.
During the five-hour session, police searched the President's Residence again after having gathered information from additional statements, as well as from repeat testimony of a former employee.
Katsav is suspected of having raped the first complainant in the affair, a former employee at his bureau. The woman, known as A., gave a second statement to police Tuesday, saying the president had forced her to engage in sexual intercourse, threatening her both verbally and physically. According to the complainant, Katsav had raped her at least twice.
Police on Wednesday questioned Katsav about a second complaint recently filed by a woman who had worked for him during his tenure as transportation minister. She told police a few days ago that Katsav had sexually harassed her repeatedly, and that he had tried to touch her inappropriately while she was working for him a few years ago.
No more complaints lodged
Police have recently interviewed several women who had worked for Katsav and claimed they had been sexually harassed or abused by the president. However, the women have yet to lodge official complaints against Katsav.
The president was questioned regarding these complaints. While the events may not allow for prosecution due to the statute of limitations, police hope they can help to establish a pattern showing that Katsav systematically sexually molested female employees.
"If we can prove Katsav is a serial sexual molester, it would significantly strengthen the first complainant's statement and facilitate formulating a charge sheet against him," a police source said Wednesday.
A President's Residence source tried to undermine the statement made by the former employee at the Transportation Ministry. They said she has become a crony of one of Katsav's political opponents who is probably using her to thwart his aspirations to contend for a leadership position in the Likud.
They also said that six years ago, when Katsav was first appointed president, the first complainant wanted to work with him, and even presented a letter that she had written outlining plans to set up a foreign liaison office and to coordinate the president's work with Diaspora Jewry.
The police queries against Katsav have so far not addressed the first complainant's allegations of improprieties in the president's granting pardons.