Nicolas Sarkozy back in court for fresh trial over alleged Libya funding | Nicolas Sarkozy
Nicolas Sarkozy will face a new trial at the Paris appeals court over allegations he conspired to receive illegal campaign financing from the regime of former Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi.
The former right-wing French president, who was in office from 2007 to 2012, denies any wrongdoing.
Last year, Sarkozy was sentenced to five years in prison for criminal conspiracy to allegedly obtain campaign funds from the Gaddafi regime. He became the first former president of an EU country to be imprisoned and the first post-war French leader to go behind bars.
After spending 20 days in a Paris prison, which he described as “exhausting” and a “nightmare”, Sarkozy was released from prison in November, pending an appeal, and published a book about his time there. For his own security, he was being kept in a single cell, a single cell of approximately 9 square metres, with its own shower and toilet.
At last year’s trial, the prosecution accused Sarkozy of making a deal with Gaddafi as interior minister in 2005 to obtain campaign finance for his successful presidential bid in 2007 in exchange for supporting the then-isolated Libyan government on the international stage.
Last year, Sarkozy was convicted of a criminal conspiracy related to a scheme to obtain election funds from Libya. He was also acquitted of three other charges, including corruption, misuse of Libyan public funds and illegal election campaign financing.
In the new appeal hearing that begins on Monday, Sarkozy will be retried on all four charges after he appealed his conviction and the prosecutor objected to his acquittals. Sarkozy, 71, faces up to 10 years in prison if convicted.
At the first hearing last year, the court heard that the Libyan regime sought diplomatic, legal and commercial privileges in exchange for money for Sarkozy’s campaign, and that it was understood that Sarkozy would improve Gaddafi’s international image. The autocratic Libyan leader, whose 41-year rule was marked by human rights violations, was isolated internationally due to his regime’s links to terrorism, including the bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland, in December 1988.
Prosecutors accused members of Sarkozy’s entourage of meeting with members of the Gaddafi regime in Libya in 2005.
Shortly after becoming president in 2007, Sarkozy invited the Libyan leader on an extended state visit to Paris, during which he pitched his Bedouin tent in the gardens near the Élysée Palace.
In 2011, Sarkozy placed France at the forefront of NATO-led airstrikes against Gaddafi’s troops, who helped rebel fighters overthrow Gaddafi’s regime. Gaddafi was captured and killed in October 2011.
A total of 10 people in the case will be retried on appeal.
