PARIS, Sept 24, 2020 (BSS/AFP) – A Paris appeals court will rule Thursday
on a legal challenge by ex-president Nicolas Sarkozy and former aides against
an investigation into claims that Libyan money was used in his 2007 election
campaign.
After several delays in the case, the latest due to France’s coronavirus
lockdown, judges examined the application behind closed doors in June.
At that hearing, prosecutors called for the appeal to be thrown out,
according to sources with information on the case.
Sarkozy has been charged over accusations by former members of Moamer
Kadhafi’s regime that he accepted millions from the slain Libyan dictator,
some of it delivered in cash-stuffed suitcases, for his first presidential
campaign in 2007.
He was charged in 2018 with taking bribes, concealing the embezzlement of
Libyan public funds and illegal campaign financing.
The probe was sparked by investigative website Mediapart publishing a
document in 2012 allegedly signed by Libya’s intelligence chief, which
purported to show that Kadhafi agreed to give Sarkozy up to 50 million euros
($58 million at today’s rates).
Sarkozy denies the charges. He maintains the document is a fake, but the
courts have ruled it can be used as evidence.
Sarkozy and his former ministers Claude Gueant, Eric Woerth and Brice
Hortefeux challenge the validity of the investigation on a number of
procedural grounds.
All but Hortefeux are charged in the case.
The former president is also seeking to invoke head-of-state immunity on
some of the counts against him.
– Several investigations into Sarkozy –
The allegations that Sarkozy took money from Kadhafi — whom he welcomed
to Paris shortly after his election with much pomp but later helped topple —
are the most serious of several investigations that have dogged the ex-
president since he left office.
The claims first emerged in 2011, as NATO-backed forces were preparing to
intervene in support of rebels seeking to end Kadhafi’s tyrannical 41-year
rule.
The investigation is also looking into claims by Franco-Lebanese
businessman Ziad Takieddine, who said he delivered suitcases stuffed with
five million euros to Sarkozy and his then chief of staff Gueant in 2006 and
2007.
Sarkozy is also charged in two other cases, one relating to fake invoices
devised to mask overspending on his failed 2012 re-election campaign, and
another for alleged influence peddling.
He is set to go on trial in the second case on October 5, when he will
become France’s first ex-president in the dock for corruption.
Sarkozy has accused the French judiciary, with which he had a fraught
relationship while in office, of hounding him.