French President Francois Hollande is not leaving his girlfriend Valerie Trierweiler for actress Julie Gayet, the French presidency said Saturday.
The announcement was made after reports spread that Hollande was going to announce his split from Trierweiler, who has been his unmarried partner since November 2007, the BBC reported.
Though they are not married, Trierweiler has been presented as Hollade's First Lady at government functions, The Guardian reported.
The story was reported by the Journal du Dimanche, a reputed national newspaper. The paper said that Trierweiler, 48, was going on a charity trip to India this weekend and that the president's office at Élysée Palace wanted to announce the split before she left.
"The press release form the Élysée Palace should be released sometime today," the paper stated, according to The Guardian.
But a spokesman for the president's office told The Guardian and the BCC the reports are "false rumors."
The love scandal began when the tabloid Closer published a story and photographs revealing Hollande's affair with the actress earlier this month. The photos allegedly show Hollande, disguised in a motorcycle helmet, arriving at night to visit Gayet, , according to The Guardian.
Gayet, who allegedly began an affair with Hollande, 59, in 2012, said she is going to sue the magazine for violating her privacy.
Hollande never denied the affair, but admitted that his relationship with Trierweiler is going through a "difficult moment," the BBC reported.
After stories of the affair circulated, Trierweiler spent a week in the hospital. She is now released, and is spending time at an official residence near Versailles, the BBC reported.
"He [Mr. Hollande] has consulted her and brought her up to date, she accepts the situation as a fait accompli, but she is leaving it to him to take the initiative," a member of Trierweiler's team told the newspaper Le Parisien, according to the BBC.
