Nicola Sturgeon opens up on sexuality and rumoured affair with female ambassador

Nicola Sturgeon has spoken out on wild claims that she had an affair with a female French diplomat.

In her new memoir, 'Frankly', the former Scottish First Ministerrejects false rumours of an intimate relationshipwith the-then French ambassador to the UK, Catherine Colonna, which began to spread on social media in late 2019. She recalls that, by early 2020, the gossip had begun "gnawing away in the background" of her everyday life after members of the public had started to ask her friends and family members about whether it was true. The rumours only went quiet for a brief period at the beginning of the Covidpandemic before circulating again, she said.

Ms Sturgeon married Peter Murrell, the former chief executive officer of the Scottish National Party, in 2010.

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In one extract from her upcoming memoir 'Frankly' published in The Times, she writes: "My family and friends were being asked about it by people who’d heard it in their local pub. Colleagues were being asked about it on doorsteps.

"One of our neighbours in Glasgow mentioned it, obliquely, to Peter, presumably thinking he had a right to know that his wife was having an affair."

Nicola Sturgeon, who was still First Minister at the time, said she had "little option" but to stay quiet on the spurious claims and to "shrug it off".

But she said she laughed about the rumours when she met Ms Colonna for the first time since lockdown at a meeting of EU ambassadors in the Scottish government’s London office, and believes she "successfully trolled the trolls" by appearing with her in photographs on two occasions later on, including at the Cop27 in Egypt in November 2022.

The former First Minister, 55, goes on to write that she has been in long-term relationships with men for more than thirty years of her life, but believes that sexuality is not binary - and that sexual relationships should be "private matters".

In another excerpt, Nicola says she is "not sure" she "will ever get over" being arrested and questioned by the police by police investigating the SNP's finances under Operation Branchform in June 2023.

In March this year, she was informed that she would face no further action by police and was no longer a suspect.

Her husband Peter Murrell was charged with embezzlement in April 2024, and appeared at Edinburgh Sheriff Court for a hearing in March this year.

Nicola and Peter announced they were separating earlier this year.

'Frankly' by Nicola Sturgeon, published by Macmillan, will go on sale next Thursday.