The head of the International Monetary Fund, Dominique Strauss-Kahn,is expected to apear in a New York court shortly to face charges ofsexual assault.

The IMF chief is facing three charges, including attempted rape. His lawyer says he'll plead not guilty.

MrStrauss-Kahn was arrested at the weekend after a 32-year-old femaleworker at the hotel he'd been staying in filed a complaint against himwith police.

Mr Strauss-Kahn, a possible Socialist candidate inthe French presidential election next April, left the hotel after thealleged incident and boarded an Air France aircraft scheduled to departfor Paris.

Police spokesman Paul Browne says the aircraft washeld at the airport and officers from the New York/New Jersey PortAuthority boarded the plane to take him into custody and hand him overto New York Police Department detectives.

"The NYPD realised he had fled, he had left his cell phone behind," Mr Browne said.

John Sheehan, director of security at Sofitel New York, says the hotel is cooperating with police.

"The safety and security of our clients and team members are of the utmost priority to us," Mr Sheehan said.

His wife has told reporters she believes he'll be found innocent.

The IMF says Mr Strauss-Kahn's arrest has not affected its operations.

The ABC's North America Correspondent, Lisa Millar, says Mr Strauss-Kahn's arrest has stunned France.

He was tipped to run for the presidency and was considered a strong contender to oust Nicolas Sarkozy.

The62-year-old took over the IMF in November 2007. Before that, he was amember of the French National Assembly and a professor of economics at
the Institut d'Etudes Politiques de Paris.

InOctober 2008, Mr Strauss-Kahn apologised for "an error of judgment"after an affair with a subordinate, but denied he had abused hisposition.

He apologised to employees, the woman he had theaffair with, Piroska Nagy, and his wife, French television personalityAnne Sinclair, for the trouble it had caused.