PARIS, Aug 18: Segoline Royal, the Socialist Party’s front-runner for president who has transformed the French political scene, said on Friday the home she shares with her partner — another possible candidate for the Elise — had been broken into.

She said her ground-floor apartment in the Paris suburb of Boulogne-Billancourt had suffered an ‘intrusion’ while she was away on vacation but that nothing was missing.

“This was not a burglary, but an intrusion and a full-scale search of my home in which nothing was stolen. Everything was turned upside down, the cupboards were emptied,” she said.

Royal shares the flat with Francois Hollande, her long-term partner and the head of the Socialist Party. Mr Hollande has also long harboured presidential ambitions but he trails far behind Royal in popular support.

Ms Royal, in a telephone interview she instigated, said she had hoped to keep the crime secret but was now confirming the break-in because of a ‘scandalous’ decision by France’s interior ministry to make the news public.

Friday’s Le Figaro newspaper reported the break-in as a burglary, saying that jewellery might have been stolen.

Ms Royal said she had reported the break-in to police but not made a formal complaint in a bid to keep the crime out of the public eye. She added that Le Figaro’s account of a burglary was wrong.

“I find it scandalous that this information was given out by the interior minister’s office even though I asked that this incident remain confidential,” she said.—AFP