Windsor Castle prepares for Mme Carla Sarkozy

FOREIGN Office officials believe President Nicolas Sarkozy will marry Carla Bruni, the model turned singer, before a state visit to Britain in March.

They say this should spare the Queen the embarrassment of offering the French head of state and his girlfriend separate bedrooms in Windsor Castle.

Saudi Arabia is reported to have told Sarkozy not to bring Bruni on a visit if the couple are not married. India has also expressed doubts about protocol.

French reports have suggested Sarkozy and Bruni will marry on February 9. The president said last week he would not let the press fix the date.

Sarkozy’s glitzy love affair came under the spotlight just as he received another broadside from his second ex-wife, Cecilia, who called him “out of control”.

“He has a real behavioural problem,” Cecilia was quoted as saying in a book that appeared yesterday, after she failed to block its publication.

She said “he leaps on girls whose names he can’t even remember” and maintained her allowance was scarcely enough to pay the rent. There was no danger, she added, that their 10-year-old son would be spoilt “like his sons, with €2,000 shoes”, a reference to Sarkozy’s children from his first marriage.

Tony Blair, Sarkozy’s candidate for EU president, addressed his party conference yesterday. “Your president is very energetic,” he said, before adding after a pause, “in every domain.”

Sarkozy grinned happily.