Former French President Nicolas Sarkozi was found guilty of the Libyan financing case and sentenced to 5 years in prison for creating a criminal community. The French media reported this on Wednesday with reference to the decision of the Paris Court.
Sarkozi was underway in the case of four accusations: passive corruption, assignment of public funds, illegal financing of the election campaign and the creation of a criminal group to commit crimes. Groups created to conceal the sources of financing the election campaign.
earlier the prosecutor’s office of Paris demanded 7 years in prison for him. For more than 10 years, Sarkoi himself rejected all the accusations, claiming that the investigation had a political background.
according to investigators, Sarczya in 2007 received about 50 million euros from the ex-leader of Libya Muammar Gaddafi to finance his presidential campaign. The money was allegedly transferred at the end of 2006 and early 2007.
After the appearance of these charges in 2013, a preliminary investigation was launched, and on March 21, 2018, Sarcoszy was detained in Paris. Then a criminal case was instituted against him.
in the framework of the case, special attention was paid to the testimonies of the businessman of the Lebanon-French origin of Ziyad Takieddin, who in 2016 said that he personally delivered Sarczya 5 million euros from Tripoli. Later, in 2020, he changed his testimony and abandoned these statements.
September 23, 2025, Takieddin died in Beirut. French investigators suspect that Sarkozy could put pressure on him through intermediaries. According to the investigation, about 608 thousand euros were spent on bribing the witness.