Ex-IMF head Strauss-Kahn to advise Serbian government

Mr Strauss-Kahn is still active in international economic affairs

The former head of the International Monetary Fund, Dominique Strauss-Kahn, has agreed to become an economic adviser to the Serbian government, officials in Belgrade say.

Mr Strauss-Kahn, a French Socialist, is being prosecuted in France on charges of pimping in the city of Lille.

In 2011 he quit the IMF after claims of a sex attack on a New York hotel maid.

Serbian Deputy PM Aleksandar Vucic said Mr Strauss-Kahn's expertise, not his private life, mattered to Belgrade.

He said Mr Strauss-Kahn would advise him, the finance minister and the prime minister, and help Serbia reschedule its debt. He is expected to arrive in Belgrade next week.

"We have already spoken. He was not happy when he saw what awaited him, but he has already suggested a few solutions," Mr Vucic added.

Austria's former chancellor Alfred Gusenbauer will also advise the Serbian government, Serbia's B92 news website reported.

Referring to the sexual assault allegations which ended Mr Strauss-Kahn's IMF career, Mr Vucic said his private life was "not the thing by which to judge someone's expertise".

The assault charges against Mr Strauss-Khan have now been dropped, and he reached a settlement with the woman involved in the case.

In July Mr Strauss-Kahn, who was once tipped to run as a presidential candidate in France, said his political career was now over.

He has been appointed a member of the board of directors at two Russian state-controlled financial institutions - the Russian Fund for Direct Investment and the Russian Bank for Regional Development.

Earlier in July, investigating magistrates in France decided he should be tried along with 12 others in connection with an alleged prostitution ring at a hotel in Lille.

Mr Strauss-Kahn has admitted attending sex parties there, but says he did not know that some of the women were paid prostitutes.