French TV broadcasts video from Strauss-Kahn's NY hotel

AFP - A French television channel Thursday broadcast for the first time security camera images from the New York hotel where Dominique Strauss-Kahn stayed on the day he was accused of sexual assault.

BFMTV broadcast images showing the former International Monetary Fund chief in May paying his bill, leaving and getting into a taxi after he was alleged to have sexually assaulted chamber maid Nafissatou Diallo.

New York prosecutors dropped the case against Strauss-Kahn, who had been tipped to win next year's French presidential election, after Diallo was deemed an unreliable witness.

Strauss-Kahn admits that a sexual liaison took place but insists it was consensual.

The images show that Strauss-Kahn was not in a hurry when he left the Sofitel hotel at 12:27 pm on the day of his arrest, May 14.

Other images show Diallo seated in a corridor and being looked after by Sofitel employees after she said Strauss-Kahn attacked her in his suite.

A hotel employee is shown and heard calling police to inform them of the alleged attack.

Two other hotel employees can be seen briefly celebrating in other images. The hotel has said the celebration was unconnected with the alleged attack.

Hotel group Accor, which owns the Sofitel, criticised the broadcasting of the footage, saying it "exposes staff members to media curiosity to no useful purpose."