MARION COTILLARD - COTILLARD CLAIMS 9/11 COMMENTS TAKEN OUT OF CONTEXT

COTILLARD CLAIMS 9/11 COMMENTS TAKEN OUT OF CONTEXT

The Oscar-winning actress Marion Cotillard has claimed her controversial comments about the September 11th terrorist attacks were taken out of context.

An old interview with the actress, on France's "Paris Premiere" programme, was published on the internet over the weekend apparently showing Cotillard questioning the official account of the 2001 terrorist attacks on the US and the 1969 moon landing.

"My statement on that programme have been taken completely out of context and been crafted into a story that has no merit," Cotillard told Access Hollywood yesterday.

"At no point did I intend to contest the horrific attacks of September 11th 2001, one of the most tragic days in all of history.

"Nonetheless, I sincerely regret if my comments offended or hurt anyone", she added.

The 2007 French interview appears to show Cotillard questioning the US' account of the World Trade Centre attacks and potentially claiming they had been planned instead of carrying out required repair work.

"I think we're lied to about a number of things," she said in the original interview.

"We see other towers of the same kind being hit by planes. Are they burned? [There] was a tower, I believe it was in Spain, which burned for 24 hours. It never collapsed. None of these towers collapsed. And there [in New York], in a few minutes, the whole thing collapsed."

"It [World Trade Centre] was a money-sucker because they were finished, it seems to me, by 1973, and to re-cable all that, to bring up-to-date all the technology and everything, it was a lot more expensive, that work, than destroying them," Cotillard added.

The actress had also questioned whether America had managed to land men on the moon.

"Did a man really walk on the moon? I saw plenty of documentaries on it, and I really wondered. And in any case I don’t believe all they tell me, that's for sure."

Bastien Duval, Cotillard's agent, told The Times: "This reportage has been taken out of context and one can only condemn such practices.

"She [Cotillard] hopes that the Americans will have enough distance to understand, but her career is not just American. She can make films everywhere."