Ex-President in court: prison sentence for Sarkozy? Judgment in Libya affair expected

It is a politically extremely explosive procedure that revolves around huge sums of money and an alleged agreement between a dictator and a French head of state: In the so-called Libya affair, the Parisian Criminal Court wants to announce its judgment about France’s ex-President Nicolas Sarkozy today. The conservative is accused of bribery and illegal campaign financing due to the alleged payment of campaign funds from Libya. He is also said to have benefited from the misappropriation of public funds. The 70-year-old has always denied the allegations.

Sarkozy threatens up to ten years in prison and a fine. The indictment called for a seven -year prison sentence for the politician called “Sarko” shortly by the people. For a former head of state, this would be unprecedented in recent French history. In addition to Sarkozy, twelve other people are charged, including three ex-minister.

Allegation: Corruption pact between Sarkozy and Al-Gaddafi

Specifically, Sarkozy is accused of having closed a corruption pact with the then Libyan ruler Muammar al-Gaddafi. Familiar Sarkozys are said to have threaded the alleged flows of money through middlemen. Several million from Libya were planned for his first presidential election campaign in 2007.

The indictment sees a number of possible consideration. At the end of 2007, Sarkozy received military honors in the Élysée Palace, which was formerly politically politically isolated Al-Gaddafi at the end of 2007. Efforts are also said to have been promised to lift an arrest warrant against Gaddafi’s brother -in -law Abdallah Senoussi. Senoussi was guilty of a French aircraft with 170 dead in Paris as the main person responsible for a terrorist attack on a French plane. Economic business also led the indictment.

Everything is a Libyan revenge campaign?

But Sarkozy has vehemently rejected the allegations. They are wrong and weak. His defense insisted that there was no evidence and asked for an acquittal. “You will never find one euro, never even one euro, not even a Libyan cent in my campaign,” said the conservative in the Paris Course Hall.

The old president even saw a revenge campaign by the al-Gaddafis in the affair. The investigations had started after the welfare family himself expressed the election campaign of the conservative. According to Sarkozy’s defense, a return carriage for taking over the leadership of the international coalition in 2011, which helped to overthrow the Gaddafi regime.

Secret meeting, middlemen, diary entries

The process has enormous explosive potential. Should the allegations come true that a later president and several ministers have accepted money from the Libyan long -term ruler system, that would be a scandal.

Among other things, the process revolved around ominous secret meetings and diary entries of a Gaddafi confidante. Payments to possible middlemen were also taken into account. The investigation lasted around ten years, the documents fill more than 70 files.

Ex-President of scandalum

While Sarkozy was once hopeful of the bourgeois right in France, he has made the headlines in recent years primarily because of his legal hurdle run. At the beginning of the year, he had to wear a boast for around three months and was not allowed to leave his house. A court guilty of bribery and unauthorized influence. The judgment – three years in prison, two of them on probation – was a novelty for a former head of state in recent French history. The punishment with ankle bond, which was actually intended for one year, has now been suspended under conditions due to Sarkozy’s age.

Also due to excessive campaign costs for his ultimately failed campaign for re -election in 2012, a Sarkozy Court of Appeal condemned a one -year prison sentence in February 2024, six months of probation. The former head of state went into revision. Sarkozy also denies all allegations in these two procedures.

Already his term in the Élysée Palace from 2007 to 2012 was characterized by affairs for rich friends, nepotism and immensified government members. He lost the 2012 election as an incumbent against socialist François Hollande. Five years later, he failed in the party -internal selection process. Despite his fight with the judiciary and without offices, he is still considered a influential voice among numerous fans of the bourgeois right.