On Wednesday, the prosecution demanded a seven-year sentence for Nicolas Sarkozy in the appeal process regarding the Libyan financing of his campaign for the 2007 presidential elections, a complex political-financial business that has already earned the former head of state a prison term, reports AFP, taken over by Agerpres.
The decision of the Court of Appeal would be given on November 30.
In case of conviction, the French president will have a last recourse: an appeal to the Court of Cassation.
After three days of indictment, the prosecutor's office requested, as in the first instance, a 7-year sentence against the head of state from 2007-2012, respectively two more than the one that was pronounced in the first instance in September.
As in the first trial, the prosecution asked the judges to declare Nicolas Sarkozy guilty of all the facts for which he is indicted, including corruption and the illegal financing of his campaign in 2007, crimes for which he was not found guilty in the first instance.
The former leader of the French right, now 71 years old and who denies any illegality, was thus sentenced to five years in prison only for “constitution of a criminal group”, the court estimating that he let his closest collaborators make arrangements with the Libyan regime in order to procure funds for the campaign.
But prosecutors allege that Nicolas Sarkozy, who was then interior minister, struck a “deal” with Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi to receive covert funding from the Libyan regime in exchange for a promise to review the legal status of a close associate.
After his conviction in the first instance, Nicolas Sarkozy became the first president incarcerated in French history, spending 20 days behind bars in a Paris prison until he was released under judicial control pending an appeal.
