The Paris Court sentenced former French President Nicholas Sarkozy to five years in prison on Thursday after he found him guilty on a major charge in his trial for financing an illegal campaign by the government of the then Libyan leader Muhammad Gaddafi.
The historical sentence Sarkozy made the first former president of modern France sentenced to actual imprisonment behind bars. In a big surprise, the court ruled that the 70 -year -old will be held, despite his intention to appeal.
He said that the date of his imprisonment will be determined at a later time, which is taking place, the conservative leader, to lead to lead from the courtroom packed in the handcuffs.
The court found that Sarkozy is guilty of the criminal association in a conspiracy from 2005 to 2007 to finance his winning campaign from Libya in exchange for diplomatic preferences. He cleared him of three other charges, including negative corruption, financing the illegal campaign, and hiding the embezzlement of public funds.
“If they want to sleep in prison, I will sleep in prison. But with my head is high,” Sarkozy said after the sentences. “I am innocent. This injustice is a scandal.
“I ask the French people-whether they vote for me or not, whether they support me or not-to understand what has just happened. Hate does not really know any limits.” He was also supported in court by his three adult children.
Questions about Libyan funds remain
The court also found two of the closest Sarkozy partners when he was president – former ministers Claude Joyant and Baris Horttefo – guilty of the criminal assembly, but they also acquired some other charges.
In general, the ruling indicated that the court believed that the men conspired in a Libyan financing request for a 2007 Sarkozy campaign, but the judges were not convinced that the conservative leader himself was directly involved in the financing effort or that any Libyan money had been used in his winning campaign.
“In order to obtain or try to obtain financial support in Libya for the purpose of securing the financing of the campaign.”
But the court also said that it could not be determined with certainty that the Libyan funds ended up financing the Sarkozy campaign.
However, under French law, the corrupt plan can still be a crime even if the money is not paid or not proven.
The accusations followed their roots until 2011, when the Libyan and Jadafi news agency said that the Libyan state has secretly converted millions of euros into a Sarkozy campaign for the year 2007.
In 2012, the French interrogation port published what he said was a Libyan intelligence note indicating a $ 50 million financing agreement ($ 81 million CDN). Sarkozy denounced the document as fraud and sued defamation. On Thursday, the court ruled that “it now seems that this document is likely to be forgery.”
The defendant died in a separate probe this week
Investigators also looked at a series of trips to Libya, which was carried out by people close to Sarkozy when he served as Minister of Interior from 2005 and 2007, including his chief of staff.
In 2016, the Lebanese French businessman Ziad Takedin Midisbart told that he had delivered bags filled with criticism from Tripoli to the French Ministry of Interior during the era of Sarkozy. He later declined his statement.
This reflection is now the focus of a separate investigation in the futility of the potential witnesses. Sarkozy and his wife have been delivered initially to participate in the alleged efforts to pressure Takieddine. This case has not yet gone to trial.
Takieddine, who was one of the participating defendants, died on Tuesday in Beirut. He was 75 years old. He fled to Lebanon in 2020 and did not attend the trial.
Gadofi, the dictator of Libya for a long time, was dropped and killed in an uprising in 2011, and ended his rule for four decades. The trial shed light on the back of France with Libya in the first decade of the twentieth century, when Gaddafi was seeking to restore diplomatic relations with the West. Before that, Libya was considered an outcast country.
Sarkozy rejected allegations as political motives and dependent on forged evidence. During the trial, he condemned a “conspiracy” that he said that “liars and fraudsters”, including the “Gaddafi clan”.
He suggested that the allegations of financing the illegal campaign were revenge, given that it was one of the first Western leaders to pushed military intervention in Libya in 2011, when it swept the protests of the Arab Spring in support of democracy the Arab world.
“What is the credibility that can be provided for such data that is characterized by revenge seal?” Sarkozy asked in the comments during the trial.
In June, Sarkozy was stripped of his honor medal – the top of the France prize – after being convicted of a separate case.
Earlier, he was convicted of the corruption and influence that wanders his attempt to bribe a judge in 2014 in exchange for information about a legal issue involved in it.
In another case, Sarkozy was convicted last year by financing an illegal campaign in his failed offer for his re -election for the year 2012. He was accused of spending nearly twice the maximum legal limit and was sentenced to a year in prison, six months were suspended.
Sarkozy denied these allegations and appealed to this ruling.
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