Nicolas Sarkozy, former president from 2007 to 2012, was placed in detention at the Parisian Santé prison on Tuesday, less than a month after being sentenced to five years in prison, two of which were suspended, for criminal association in the case involving the alleged Libyan financing of his 2007 presidential campaign.
According to the ruling handed down on September 25, the former president was found guilty of allowing two of his closest collaborators, Claude Guéant and Brice Hortefeux, to begin negotiations in Tripoli with the regime of Muammar Gaddafi while he was still Minister of the Interior.
These discussions, held in 2005 with Abdallah Senoussi, Gaddafi’s brother-in-law and a man sentenced to life imprisonment in France for the 1989 UTA DC-10 bombing, aimed to secure covert funding for Sarkozy’s future presidential campaign. Although no money transfer was proven, the court concluded that the mere initiation of these negotiations was enough to constitute a criminal offense.
The severity of the sentence, and particularly the immediate imprisonment, caused shock within the French political landscape. The Paris criminal court justified its decision by citing the « exceptional gravity » of the charges, stating that they undermined « citizens’ trust in democracy. »
In a message posted Tuesday morning on the social media platform X, Nicolas Sarkozy once again declared his innocence, comparing his fate to that of Captain Dreyfus, a victim of a major judicial error in the late 19th century.
His lawyers immediately filed a request for his release, calling his imprisonment a « shame » and denouncing « judicial harassment. »
Sarkozy is being held in solitary confinement. He is allowed one daily solitary walk in a small courtyard and, according to a strict schedule, can access a small gym or the prison’s library.