French mass rape survivor speaks out against humiliating allegations of complicity

The former wife of the French man accused of enlisting strangers to rape her while she was drugged said on Wednesday that she felt humiliated during his trial, accusing some defence lawyers of claiming she was complicit in the abuse.

"Since setting foot in this courtroom I have felt humiliated," Gisele Pelicot said at the trial of her former husband and 50 other men for rape.

"I'm being called an alcoholic, and someone who gets intoxicated to the point of becoming Mr Pelicot's accomplice," she said.

Dominique Pelicot, 71, has admitted slipping his then wife Gisele sedatives to render her unconscious so that he and dozens of strangers could rape her for nearly a decade.

"I was in a comatose state and the videos that will be shown will prove this," she said.

"I never, even for a single second, gave my consent to Mr Pelicot or those other men" who are also on trial, she said, accusing them of giving the impression that she was "the guilty party and those 50 men victims".

Gisele Pelicot said she was reacting to remarks by Paul-Roger Gontard, one of the lawyers for the defence, who told the court that "there's rape and there's rape" in a possible attempt to back up some of the men's claim that they assumed they were participating in a libertine couple's sex game.

"No, there are no different types of rape," she said. "Rape is rape."

The lawyer subsequently apologised to her, saying he had wanted to distinguish the legal definition of rape from the "media" definition.

"I am sorry that these remarks hurt and shocked you," he said.