Where was Nicolas Sarkozy when the Berlin Wall fell?

The French president suggests _ in a casual post on his Facebook page _ that he was at Checkpoint Charlie, chipping away at the Cold War with a pickax alonside throngs of Berliners on Nov. 9, 1989.

French journalists aren't so sure. They question his account of the epochal event and suggest he only went a day or even a week later. They are asking why Sarkozy didn't speak of it earlier, posting his account only Sunday, the night before leaving for Berlin to mark Monday's 20th anniversary of the Wall's demise with other world leaders.

French Web sites and airwaves Monday obsessed about Sarkozy's whereabouts in 1989. The debate threatened to overshadow a costly concert and light show in central Paris Monday night celebrating the anniversary.

Beyond the dithering over dates, the affair renewed criticism of a leader critics say is untouchable even when he makes mistakes, and oft-dubbed an "omnipresident" for dominating French politics and media.

The Facebook post is entitled "Memories of the fall of the Berlin wall, Nov. 9, 1989" and is topped by a picture of Sarkozy chipping into a graffiti-covered wall.

At the time, Sarkozy was a 34-year-old top official in the conservative RPR party, serving under Alain Juppe, who later became prime minister.

"The morning of November 9th, we were interested by information coming from Berlin, seeming to announce a change in Germany's divided capital. Alain Juppe and I decided to leave Paris to participate in the event that was shaping up," the Facebook post says.

Alain Auffray of the left-leaning daily Liberation, who reported from Berlin that day, says Sarkozy couldn't have arrived so quickly, because the events unfolded late in the day Nov. 9.

"No one knew that morning what would happen," he told The Associated Press by telephone from Berlin on Monday. The press conference that opened the border was in the evening, and the crowds began arriving well after nightfall.

Auffray suggested the dates were fudged and that Sarkozy was there a few days later.

"For me it's not an illustration of a megalomaniacal president, but of the pressure on his aides to tell nice stories" about the president, he said.

Conservative French daily Le Figaro published archived articles showing that Juppe was at an event in rural France _ far from Checkpoint Charlie _ on Nov. 9 and that he went to Berlin on Nov. 16.

German newspaper Web sites Monday questioned a "PR legend" and a "dubious sounding story about the Berlin wall." Continued...