Sarkozy arrested

Former French president in custody over Gaddafi funding claims.

PARIS: Former French President Nicolas Sarkozy (pic) was placed in custody as part of an investigation that he received millions of euros in illegal financing from the regime of the late Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi.

A judicial source with direct knowledge of the case said that Sarkozy was being held at the Nanterre police station, west of Paris. The person spoke on condition of anonymity.

Sarkozy and his former chief of staff have denied wrongdoing in the case, which involves funding for his winning 2007 presidential campaign.

Though an investigation has been under way since 2013, the case gained traction some three years later when French-Lebanese businessman Ziad Takieddine told the online investigative site, Mediapart, that he delivered suitcases from

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Libya containing 5mil (RM24mil) in cash to Sarkozy and his former chief of staff Claude Gueant.

A lawyer for Sarkozy did not immediately respond to a message seeking comments.

Investigators are examining claims that Gaddafi’s regime secret

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ly gave Sarkozy 50mil (RM240mil) overall for the 2007 campaign. Such a sum would be more than double the legal campaign funding limit at

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the time of 21mil (RM101mil).

In addition, the alleged payments would violate French rules against foreign financing and declaring the source of campaign funds.

In the Mediapart interview published in November 2016, Takieddine

 said he was given 5mil in Tripoli by Gaddafi’s intelligence chief on trips in late 2006 and 2007 and that he gave the money in suitcases full of cash to Sarkozy and Gueant on three occasions. He said the handovers took place in the Interior Ministry.

Takieddine has for years been embroiled in his own problems with French justice, centering mainly on allegations he provided illegal funds to the campaign of conservative politician Edouard Balladur for his 1995 presidential election campaign – via commissions from the sale of French submarines to Pakistan. — AP