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TOKYO – The tragic arrest of Carlos Ghosn and his long detention in a tiny Tokyo cell has caused outrage in France – and has cast the spotlight on the infamous criminal justice system in Japan.
Ghosn, who has French, Brazilian and Lebanese nationality, was arrested while he was arriving at Haneda Airport on November 19, suspected of underestimating his compensation for corporate deposits. with the Tokyo Stock Exchange. A few days later, he was dismissed from the positions of president of Nissan Motor and Mitsubishi Motors, although he remains president and CEO of Renault, third stage of the automobile alliance that he ran For almost 20 years.
French media and politicians strongly criticize the treatment of Mr Ghosn. Many in France speculate that Nissan has organized a "coup d'etat" to dismiss the Brazilian-born leader.
"Japan may be a democracy, but this procedure is totally unbalanced in terms of the rights of the accused," writes the weekly news magazine Le Point on November 21. "This treatment is intolerable from the point of view of French law."
Other media raised questions about the events that led to the fall of Ghosn. "It is interesting to note that we have never heard of all these criticisms," said the daily Le Figaro. "It's as if a lid had been removed suddenly." Les Echos wrote that there are conjectures in France that the arrest of Ghosn was a "coup d'etat planned by the Japanese".
The Minister of Finance, Bruno Le Maire, addressed the issue at a press conference on 21 November, saying that France was "a state of law" and valued "respect for the presumption of innocence ".
The Mayor also said that the Japanese Minister of Economy, Hiroshige Seko, had reached an agreement while the latter was in Paris "that it was better that the participations [of the alliance] remain unchanged and the rules of governance already established do not change ".
Seko denied that such an agreement was reached.
Ghosn is currently being held at the Tokyo Detention Center, probably in a cell of about 5 square meters. Meals taken in the establishment are mainly rice and barley, and the suspects are only allowed to meet with their lawyers, although international treaties allow consular officials to visit foreigners.
In Japan, a suspect can be held in detention until 23 days after arrest without being charged with a crime. After that, prosecutors must either prosecute or release the suspect.
The main defender of Ghosn is Motonari Otsuru, a former Tokyo attorney known for overthrowing entrepreneur maverick Takafumi Horie and shareholder militant Yoshiaki Murakami.
While Nissan also accused Ghosn of embezzling funds from the company and misrepresenting the company's investments, prosecutors only mentioned the relatively lesser charge that he would have underestimated his compensation. Legal experts have stated that this approach corresponds to a common strategy of Japanese prosecutors consisting of initially focusing on the prosecution that seems most likely to stick to it.
The conviction for the treatment of Ghosn was also received in Japan, including by Nobuo Gohara, a former prosecutor who now heads a law firm.
"There is a very big question mark about the validity of his arrest," Gohara said at a press conference on November 26.
"The arrest took place very quickly, without a thorough examination of the validity of the evidence and without mentioning" the remuneration of the executive ", he added." The actions of the prosecutors from Tokyo seemed very violent and lacking any justification. "
Gohara also asked whether Japan's recently introduced plea bargaining system was actually used.
"Plea bargaining is only used when some people are aware of the crime, and if many Nissan executives who are aware of the securities reports were aware, the system could no longer be applied," he said. -he declares. "It seems to me more like an agreement between Nissan executives and prosecutors that Ghosn is solely responsible for undercounting his pay."
Gohara also criticized the Japanese prosecution system as a whole. "The conviction rate in Japan is 99.9%, which means that once you're charged, you're almost certain to be convicted, the prosecutors' power being very important." Is a critical problem of Japanese criminal procedure. "
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