PARIS — President Chirac of France was questioned by a judge yesterday as part of an investigation into allegations of corruption in party funding, dating from the former French president’s time as Paris mayor.

Just two months after leaving office, Mr. Chirac, 74, was interviewed as an “assisted witness” in the presence of a lawyer. Technically, he still faces the prospect of criminal charges, but judicial sources told the Daily Telegraph that the prospect of this was “slim.”

The meeting with Judge Alain Philibeaux at Mr. Chirac’s office on the Left Bank in Paris lasted just under four hours.

“You will have noticed that this was an interview which within a judicial context was relatively short,” said Mr. Chirac’s lawyer, Jean Veil, adding, “It went ahead calmly and courteously.”

In an article in Le Monde published yesterday, Mr. Chirac said his decision to answer the judge’s questions was “perfectly normal and in keeping with the conception I have always had of the principles of the republic.”

The so-called “fake jobs” investigation is into allegations that members of Mr. Chirac’s now defunct Rally for the Republic Party had their salaries paid by Paris city hall or by private companies that won contracts there.

Alain Juppe, Mr. Chirac’s close ally and a former prime minister, was convicted in the affair in 2004, earning him a one-year ban from politics.

Mr. Chirac, who stepped down as president in May, was mayor of Paris between 1977 and 1995. Three other party investigations from the period remain open.

Mr. Chirac’s lawyer said, while his client would “answer all questions in all the cases that may concern him,” he refused to be questioned on the so-called Clearstream scandal, as he was “protected by presidential immunity.” That investigation is into allegations that President Sarkozy was the victim of a smear campaign in 2004 aimed at derailing his campaign for the presidency.