Karim Benzema set to sue Minister Gerald Darmanin for false allegation with terror links

Karim Benzema has retired from international football

Karim Benzema, a former striker for Real Madrid, is thinking about suing French Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin after he charged him on Tuesday with having ties to the contentious Muslim Brotherhood, which is regarded as a terrorist organisation by certain nations but not France.

The current Ballon d'Or winner has reportedly already launched defamation lawsuits against Conservative politician Nadine Morano, who is also an elected member of the European Parliament, and publicist Frank Tapiro, as reported by the French daily newspaper Le Parisien.

“This is false! Karim Benzema has never had any relation in the slightest with this organisation,”

Hugues Vigier, the striker's attorney, told Le Parisien on Wednesday that the past French international was thinking about suing Darmanin.

The unwillingness of Karim Benzema to sing the La Marseillaise, the French national song, for which he was frequently condemned when playing for France, was used by the French interior minister to support his assertion that Benzema had ties to the Muslim Brotherhood.

In the course of the inquiry into the assassination of French high school teacher Samuel Paty, who was assassinated by an Islamic terrorist, he also brought focus on an image in which Benzema was seen standing next to Iman Meaux Nourdine Mamoune, whose residence was under search in 2020.

The player's liking of a social media posting by Russian MMA fighter Khabib Nurmagedov criticising French President Emmanuel Macron and his "disciples" for "insulting the faith" of more than 1.5 billion Muslims was the final point Darmanin made.