Strauss-Kahn returns to Paris

New York prosecutors later dropped their case against Strauss-Kahn, former head of the International Monetary Fund, because of questions about the maid's credibility.

But the affair cost Strauss-Kahn his job at the helm of the IMF and exposed his personal life to worldwide scrutiny that has stained his image and left the French divided over what he should do next. His high-profile return home Sunday reflects how large he looms here.

Smiling and waving silently, he stepped off an Air France flight Sunday at Paris' Charles de Gaulle Airport a different man from the one who, just four months ago, had been the pollsters' favorite to beat French President Nicolas Sarkozy in next year's presidential elections.

Few expect Strauss-Kahn to return to French politics soon — his Socialist Party is already in the throes of their presidential primary — but his supporters have been eagerly awaiting his return after a monthslong legal drama in the U.S. that they saw as unfairly hostile to him.

Jack Lang, a former Socialist government minister and a neighbor of Strauss-Kahn, told The Associated Press that his friend would play a “very important role, not necessarily in the campaign, but in the life of France, the life of Europe.”

Lang said that the French people will eventually forget the scandal. “What scandal? In my eyes, he is innocent.”

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