French authorities are investigating new allegations that the former head of the IMF, Dominique Strauss-Kahn, sexually assaulted a woman at the W Hotel in D.C., according to the New York Times.

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French prosecutors said investigators are looking into allegations that Strauss-Kahn may have raped a Belgian prostitute during a sex party in 2010 at the D.C. hotel, the New York Times reports.

Prosecutors last month charged Strauss-Kahn in connection with a pimping ring in Lille, a northern city in France.

Meanwhile, a hotel maid's sexual assault lawsuit against Strauss-Kahn can go forward to trial, a judge ruled this week, rebuffing the former International Monetary Fund leader's diplomatic immunity claim.

Bronx state Supreme Court Justice Douglas McKeon's ruling kept alive the civil case that emerged from a May 2011 hotel-room encounter that also spurred now-dismissed criminal charges against Strauss-Kahn, then a French presidential hopeful.

The episode was the first in a series of allegations about his sexual conduct that sank his political career.

The housekeeper, Nafissatou Diallo, 33, said Strauss-Kahn, 63, tried to rape her when she arrived to clean his Manhattan hotel suite.

Strauss-Kahn has denied doing anything violent during the encounter. Prosecutors dropped related criminal charges last summer, saying they had developed doubts about her trustworthiness because she had lied about her background and her actions right after the alleged attack.

Diallo has insisted she told the truth about what happened in the encounter itself. Strauss-Kahn resigned his IMF job days after his arrest, and he didn't assert immunity from the criminal prosecution; his lawyers have said he was focused then on trying to exonerate himself.

The lawsuit was filed about three months later.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.