Former French President Nicolas Sarkozy sentenced to five years in prison
Former French President Nicolas Sarkozy has been sentenced to five years in prison.
The former president, 70, was found guilty of criminal conspiracy, but was cleared of all other charges in the trial over the alleged illegal financing of his 2007 presidential campaign by the government of late Libyan dictator Moammar Gaddafi.
The court in Paris found him guilty of criminal conspiracy, but not guilty of passive corruption, illegal campaign financing, and concealing the embezzlement of public funds.
In a surprise move, the judge said he would be jailed regardless of whether he appeals the verdict, which usually suspends sentencing. He was not sent straight to jail, however, with the start date of his sentence yet to be decided.
Sarkozy denied the charges during the three-month court case, which he claimed was politically motivated.
He was accompanied to Thursday’s hearing by his wife, singer and model Carla Bruni-Sarkozy, and his three sons.
Overall, the verdict suggested the former president and his co-defendants had conspired to seek Libyan campaign funding – but not that he was directly involved or that money was actually used.
The judge said Sarkozy had allowed his associates to reach out to Libyan authorities “to obtain or try to obtain financial support in Libya for the purpose of securing campaign financing”.
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Sarkozy says he will appeal guilty verdict
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Earlier this year, Sarkozy was stripped of his Legion of Honour medal, France‘s highest accolade.
In 2021, he was found guilty of trying to bribe a magistrate for information about a legal case in which he was implicated in 2014. Two years later, he was sentenced to a year on electronic tag, of which six months were suspended. After three months, it was ruled he could remove the monitoring device due to his age.
In another case last year, he was convicted of illegal campaign financing during his unsuccessful 2012 re-election bid, having spent almost twice the allowed amount. He was sentenced to a year in prison, with six months suspended.
He has appealed the sentence and is awaiting the outcome from France’s highest court – the Court of Cassation.
Despite his criminal record, Sarkozy has remained an influential figure within the French Right.
Nicolas Sarkozy (right) and Muammar Gaddafi (second right) in 2007. Pic: Reuters
Light shed on French-Libyan relations during Gaddafi’s rule
During the Gaddafi finance trial, he described the case against him as a “plot” staged by the “Gaddafi clan” and other “liars and crooks”.
He claimed it was revenge for his decision to call for Gaddafi to be removed from office.
The allegations stretch back to 2011 when a Libyan news agency reported that Gaddafi had said Libya had secretly sent millions of euros to Sarkozy’s election campaign.
A year later, French investigative outlet Mediapart published what it claimed to be a piece of Libyan intelligence referencing a £43.7m funding agreement, which Sarkozy rubbished and saw him sue for defamation.
The court ruled on Thursday that it “now appears most likely that this document was a forgery”.
In the current case, Sarkozy had 11 co-defendants, including three former ministers.
Two of them, Claude Gueant and Brice Hortefeux, both among his closest confidantes during his presidency, were also found guilty of criminal association but not guilty on other charges.
The trial shed light on France’s relationship with Libya during the 2000s, when Gaddafi, who was toppled and killed in 2011, was trying to restore diplomatic ties with Western countries.
It also saw investigators scrutinise several trips to Libya made by people in Sarkozy’s inner circle while he was still interior minister between 2005 and 2007 – including his chief-of-staff.
In a key development in 2016, Franco-Lebanese businessman Ziad Takieddine told Mediapart he had delivered suitcases full of cash from Tripoli to the French interior ministry while Sarkozy was in charge – but later retracted the claims.
Co-defendant Franco-Lebanese businessman Ziad Takieddine. Pic: Reuters
Mr Takieddine, who was one of the co-defendants, died aged 75 on Tuesday in Beirut, according to his lawyer Elise Arfi said. He fled to Lebanon in 2020 and did not attend the trial.
His change-of-heart is now subject to a separate investigation into alleged witness interference – but it has not yet gone to trial.
The fast-moving developments on Trump’s Ukraine peace deal are dominating the G20 summit in South Africa, as European leaders scramble to put together a counter-proposal to the US-Russia 28-point plan and reinsert Ukraine into these discussions.
European countries are now working up proposals to put to President Trump ahead of his deadline of Thursday to agree a deal.
Ukraine is in a tight spot. It cannot reject Washington outright – it relies on US military support to continue this war – but neither can it accept the terms of a deal that is acutely favourable to Russia, requiring Ukraine to give up territory not even occupied by Moscow and reducing its army.
Overnight, the UK government has reiterated its position that any deal must deliver a “just and lasting peace”.
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The prime minister, who spoke with E3 allies President Macron of France, Chancellor Merz of Germany and President Zelenskyy of Ukraine on the phone on Friday, is having more conversations today with key partners as they work out how to handle Trump and improve this deal for Ukraine.
One diplomatic source told me allies are being very careful not to criticise Trump or his approach for fear of exacerbating an already delicate situation.
Instead, the prime minister is directing his attacks at Russia.
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Prime Minister Keir Starmer attends a plenary session on the first day of the G20 Leaders’ Summit. Pic: Reuters
“There is only one country around the G20 table that is not calling for a ceasefire in Ukraine and one country that is deploying a barrage of drones and missiles to destroy livelihoods and murder innocent civilians,” he said on Friday evening.
“Time and again, Russia pretends to be serious about peace, but its actions never live up to its words.”
Pic: AP
On the Trump plan, the prime minister said allies are meetin on Saturday “to discuss the current proposal on the table, and in support of Trump’s push for peace, look at how we can strengthen this plan for the next phase of negotiations”.
Strengthening the plan really means that they want to rebalance it towards Ukraine’s position and make it tougher on Russia.
“Ukraine has been ready to negotiate for months, while Russia has stalled and continued its murderous rampage. That is why we must all work together with both the US and Ukraine, to secure a just and lasting peace once and for all,” said the prime minister.
“We will continue to coordinate closely with Washington and Kyiv to achieve that. However, we cannot simply wait for peace.
“We must strain every sinew to secure it. We must cut off Putin’s finance flows by ending our reliance on Russian gas. It won’t be easy, but it’s the right thing to do.”
Pic: AP
Europeans hadn’t even seen this deal earlier in the week, in a sign that the US is cutting other allies out of negotiations – for now at least.
Starmer and other European leaders want to get to a position where Ukraine and Europe are at least at the table.
There is some discussion about whether European leaders such as Macron and Meloni might travel to Washington to speak to Trump early next week in order to persuade him of the European and Ukrainian perspective, as leaders did last August following the US-Russian summit in Alaska.
But Sky News understands there are no discussions about the PM travelling to Washington next week ahead of the budget.
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