French actor Gerard Depardieu, 74, has denied rape and sexual assault allegations made against him, publishing an open letter in French newspaper Le Figaro under the title “Je veux enfin vous dire ma vérité,” meaning: “I finally want to tell you my truth.”

“Never, ever have I abused a woman,” Depardieu wrote, according to English-language reports by news agency Agence France-Presse and the BBC. “To the media court, to the lynching that has been reserved for me, I have only my word to defend myself.”

The veteran actor was investigated for alleged rape in 2021 after a woman accused him of raping and assaulting her in Paris in August 2018. Depardieu’s lawyer told AFP at the time that his client “totally dispute[d]” the allegation.

Earlier this year, Depardieu was hit with fresh allegations of sexual assault or harassment by 13 women, according to an investigation by French news website Mediapart. At the time, the actor denied any criminal behavior through his Paris-based law firm Cabinet Temime. The firm said some of the accounts in the Médiapart report appeared to be based on “very subjective assessments and/or moral judgments.”

Sunday night’s open letter in Le Figaro marks the first time that Depardieu has responded to these allegations directly.

“I can no longer allow what I hear, what I have read about myself for several months,” he wrote, according to the BBC. “Hurting a woman would be like kicking my own mother in the stomach.” He also suggested that the woman who accused him of rape came up to his room “of her own free will.”