Ex-Libyan PM confirms claim Kadhafi funded Sarkozy in 2007

A lawyer for former Libyan prime minister Baghdadi al-Mahmudi says his client can confirm that ex-Libyan dictator Moamer Kadhafi's regime funded French President Nicolas Sarkozy's 2007 election campaign. 

AFP PHOTO/MAHMUD TURKIA

According to Bechir Essed, the deal was concluded by former Libyan intelligence
chief Moussa Koussa on the instructions of Kadhafi and that "documents proving
the transaction exist."

"Moamer Kadhafi, his regime and the officials who worked with him financed Sarkozy's election campaign in 2007," he told reporters in the Tunisian capital, Tunis, where Mahmudi is detained, mentioning the sum of some 50 million euros.

Another lawyer for Mahmudi, who is facing two demands for extradition to Tripoli, confirmed the claim, adding that his client believes Sarkozy is behind his detention in Tunisia.

"My arrest and my detention in Tunisia were instigated by the French president so that the details of the financing of his 2007 campaign are not revealed," Mahmudi said, according to his lawyer Mabrouk Kourchid.

On Saturday, French website Mediapart posted what it said was a 2006 document signed by Kussa referring to an "agreement in principle to support the 2007 campaign for the candidate for the presidential elections, Nicolas Sarkozy, for a sum equivalent to 50 million euros."

Sarkozy, who faces a tough second-round vote on Sunday against Socialist candidate Francois Hollande in his bid to win a second presidential term, said he was taking legal action against Mediapart and dismissed the document as a "crude forgery".

Libya's National Transitional Council, NTC,, successors of Kadhafi's ousted regime, said the note was thought to be a fake, and Kussa from exile in Doha also dismissed the document.