In his many years of lobbying, Jean-Pierre Duthion made plenty of friends. And plenty of enemies, too. More often than not, they were the same people. His former business partners and acquaintances paint an identical portrait of the man: One day, he is the charming, funny and smooth-talking Jean-Pierre Duthion, who's easy to talk to, calls you "brother" after an hour and has unbelievable anecdotes. On another, he is the boastful Jean-Pierre Duthion who doesn't keep his promises, and who can be so sanguine as to suggest settling disagreements in a boxing ring.

"Jean-Pierre is an endearing guy, but he's a nutcase. He's a huge seducer, he knows how to talk to you to make you fall for him," said Stéphane C., a former local councilor from Lyon who has since moved into sports consulting. He met Duthion in the early 2020s. "He knew I was in the Parti Socialiste, and told me about his involvement in the Jospin campaign in 2002 [when former prime minister Lionel Jospin ran for president]. After that, in all our interactions, all he talked to me about was human rights. One day he told me about the situation at the head of Interpol and asked me to write an opinion piece for elected representatives to sign."

The subject is one that Qatar is keen to put forward to criticize its Saudi and Emirati rivals. The op-ed against the appointment of Emirati general Ahmed Naser Al-Raisi as the head of Interpol, was published in Le Monde in June 2021 (in French). "Jean-Pierre then gave me €5,000 in cash, and I began questioning," explained the text's author.

Duthion also spoke to Stéphance C. about possible sports contracts. He boasted high-ranking contacts at Paris Saint-Germain (PSG) and in Qatar and introduced him to a lobbyist hired by the emirate, Nabil Ennasri. Together, they discussed major sports projects in Qatar, focusing on sustainable development and the modernization of the country. "They told me: 'No problem, you come to Qatar, we'll introduce you to the minister of sports." None of the projects ever came to fruition. "I admit, Jean-Pierre fascinated me, but he tricked me: he sold me access to one of the biggest sports organizers in the world, the stuff of progress and human rights, and behind it, there was a whole disgusting mechanism of influence."

Disagreements are far more pronounced in other instances. At the end of 2022, Duthion and another lobbyist "pitched" a communications plan to the staff of General Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, known as Hemedti, the powerful leader of Sudan's Rapid Support Forces who has been accused of war crimes. The grandiose and poorly put-together project – the French lobbyists boasted of having contacts at a very high level in both the White House and the Kremlin – was rejected.

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