Gerard Depardieu defends moving out of France, Prime Minister calls it 'pathetic'

Actor Gerard Depardieu has left his home country of France and moved to Belgium, and now he’s writing a letter to French Premier Jean-Marc Ayrault to explain why.

The Golden Globe award winner wrote in a letter published in French weekly Le Journal du Dimanche that he has left France “because you believe that success, creation, talent, anything different must be sanctioned.”

He continued, “I am sending you back my passport and social security, which I have never used," adding there are "numerous and personal" reasons why he decided to go.

Depardieu is said to be leaving France to pay lower taxes, as he stated he has paid 145 million Euro in taxes in his 45 years living there. Last week, Ayrault said of Depardieu that it was "pathetic to move to the other side of the border to not pay taxes,” Ace Showbiz reports.

In response, Depardieu said “I don’t expect to be pitied or praised, but I reject the word pathetic,” Bloomberg reports.

“I am totally scandalized,” said Culture Minister Aurelie Filippetti. “Gerard Depardieu is abandoning the battleground in the middle of the war against the crisis.”