French news channel hopes Syria's embassy will help with inquiry into how it was duped into reporting ambassador had quit

This article is more than 9 years old

This article is more than 9 years old

French television news station France 24 is to take legal action after it was apparently hoaxed into reporting the resignation of Lamia Shakkour, the Syrian ambassador in Paris.

France 24 has filed charges for "identity theft and impersonation" after claims that the woman it interviewed who purported to be Shakkour was an impostor.

The network said it hoped Shakkour and the Syrian embassy in Paris, which it claims supplied the telephone number used in the interview, would co-operate with the police investigation.

France 24 thought it had a scoop when on Tuesday evening it heard a woman claiming to be the ambassador resigning live on air, citing her opposition to the government crackdown against demonstrations in Syria.

However, the resignation report was angrily denied and Shakkour went on to another French television network to accuse France 24 of "misinformation" saying her identity had been stolen.

While France 24 insisted it had called the ambassador on a number provided by the Syrian embassy and used to contact her in the past, Shakkour reportedly refused to speak to the station.

Now the television company said it had commissioned voice comparison analyses, which concluded the voice on Tuesday night's programme was different from the voice of the woman who issued the subsequent denials.

In a statement, France 24 said the invitation to Shakkour to take part in its Debate programme about Syria was made via the Syrian embassy in Paris which, "when contacted by telephone and email, provided a telephone number said to be that of the ambassador, together with a photograph of the ambassador.

"It was using this number that the exchange took place, in which the declaration of the ambassador's resignation was made. That resignation was then confirmed in a wire published by the Reuters press agency, quoting the Syrian Embassy as its source."

It added: "France 24 has no option but to take Ms Shakkour's denials seriously."

The channel said it "had no doubt" that she and her embassy would lend their total support to the legal complaint and cooperate fully in the ensuing investigations.