A Saudi princess is on trial in absentia, accused of conspiring to kidnap and beat a worker in Paris.
Princess Hassa bint Salman - the sister of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman - has been accused of ordering her bodyguard to strike the workman in her family apartment in 2016.
Ashraf Eid told police that he was working in the apartment when she accused him of taking photos of her. He says the princess' bodyguard then beat him up, tied his hands and forced him to kiss the princess's feet.
The bodyguard told the court: "When I heard the princess shouting for help, I got there and saw them grasping the phone with their hands."
"I seized (him) and overpowered him, I didn't know what he was after," he said, according to AFP.
However, the princess' legal team says she is the victim of false allegations.
"The princess is a caring, humble, approachable and cultured woman," her lawyer Emmanuel Moyne told Reuters before the trial began.
The bodyguard has been charged with armed violence, theft, issuing death threats and holding someone against their will, CBS News reports.
The princess left the country and remains in Saudi Arabia despite an international arrest warrant issued in 2017. Prosecutors are requesting a six-month suspended prison sentence.
Newshub.
