Sarkozy is accused of two new crimes for pressuring a witness in the case investigating his ties to Gaddafi

Former French President Nicolas Sarkozy has been accused of “covering up witness tampering” and “participating in a criminal association to commit the crime of procedural fraud,” according to what the newspaper Le Monde reported this Friday.

Sarkozy testified this Tuesday before an investigating judge in Paris who is investigating whether he pressured a shady Franco-Lebanese businessman, who after accusing him of receiving money for his 2007 Elysée campaign from Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi, suddenly retracted his statement.

The Paris Judicial Court is trying to determine whether Sarkozy intervened directly or indirectly to get Ziad Takieddine to exonerate him of having financed himself with funds from the Gaddafi regime.

The conservative politician, who was in the Elysée from 2007 to 2012, will sit in the dock at the beginning of 2025 for allegedly receiving these illicit funds.

The question now is that Sarkozy will also have to face these two new accusations for allegedly having used his power of influence to try to avoid the accusations of Takkiedine, who for years claimed that the Libyan leader had paid Sarkozy to get to the head of state.

At that time, he had explained having given the then Minister of the Interior and his right-hand man, Claude Guéant (who would later occupy the Interior Department), three suitcases with millions of euros that he had received from Gaddafi's entourage.

The fact is that, first in an interview with two media outlets at the end of 2020 and then in a letter to the investigating magistrates, the Franco-Lebanese arms dealer gave a complete and unexplained turn to his statements.