The chief of the International Monetary Fund - a Frenchman nicknamed "the great seducer" - was dragged off a flight at Kennedy Airport Saturday

The chief of the International Monetary Fund - a Frenchman nicknamed "the great seducer" - was dragged off a flight at Kennedy Airport Saturday after a Manhattan hotel maid accused him of sexual assault.

Port Authority cops hauled Dominique Strauss-Kahn, 62, from the first-class cabin of Paris-bound Air France Flight 23 moments before its 4:40 p.m. takeoff, cops said.

Strauss-Kahn, a top presidential contender in France who is married to a New York-born journalist, is "being arrested for a criminal sex act, attempted rape and unlawful imprisonment," top NYPD spokesman Paul Browne said.

The 32-year-old Sofitel hotel maid provided a terrifying account of the attack to cops.

At about 1 p.m., she walked into Strauss-Kahn's $3,000-a-night-suite - Room 2806 - at the posh W. 44th St. hotel, thinking it was empty.

Strauss-Kahn emerged from the bathroom naked, chased her down the hallway in his suite and yanked her into a bedroom, where he sexually assaulted her, the maid told police.

She fought him off, but he dragged her into the bathroom, forced her to perform oral sex and tried to peel off her panties.

At one point, he tried to lock the suite's door.

The woman escaped, scampered out of the room and alerted a hotel staffer, who called 911, according to cops.

The frisky Frenchie high-tailed it out of the hotel to the airport before cops arrived, leaving his cell phone and other personal items behind, police said.

"It looked like he got out of there in a hurry," Browne said.

The maid was taken by ambulance to Roosevelt Hospital and treated for minor injuries and released, police said.

An army of cops and detectives were seen milling about on the hotel's 28th floor last night.

Strauss-Kahn, who had been running well ahead of French President Nicolas Sarkozy in opinion polls, has reportedly hired prominent New York lawyer Benjamin Brafman and was not speaking to investigators.

This is not the first time the playboy pol has been embroiled in a sex scandal.

Three years ago, Strauss-Kahn was accused of having a fling with a former underling at the Davos international forum.

The affair emerged after the woman's furious husband, a senior Argentine economist named Mario Blejer, claimed Strauss-Kahn had seduced his Hungarian wife, Piroska Nagy, an IMF staffer at the time.

The embarrassing claims prompted Strauss-Kahn to issue an apology saying, "I accept that this incident represents a serious error of judgment."

Even before the incident, Strauss-Kahn had been dubbed "un grand seducteur" because of his reputation as a free-wheeling ladies man.

Twice divorced, Strauss-Kahn is married to French TV journalist Anne Sinclair and has four children.

No one answered the door at Strauss-Kahn's two-story, red brick mansion in Washington, D.C.'s posh Georgetown neighborhood last night. A black BMW SUV with diplomatic plates sat in the driveway.

A spokesman for the IMF said the organization had no immediate comment on reports of Strauss-Kahn's arrest.

He is not protected by diplomatic immunity, sources said.

Hours before he was pulled from the flight, a close Socialist Party ally claimed Strauss-Kahn was the target of a smear campaign by Sarkozy.

The ex-French finance minister is reportedly preparing legal action over media reports saying he enjoys a lavish lifestyle.

According to one report, Strauss-Kahn spends huge sums of cash on expensive suits from a luxury tailor in Washington known to serve President Obama.

Strauss-Kahn, who has yet to say if he will run for French president, would have to quit his IMF post to do so.

His arrest was seen as a devastating blow to his presidential aspirations.