Convicted ex-President Sarkozy says will 'sleep in prison with head held high'

Former French president Nicolas Sarkozy speaks to the press flanked by his wife Carla Bruni after the verdict in his trial for illegal campaign financing from Libya for his successful 2007 presidential bid, at the Tribunal de Paris courthouse in Paris, on September 25, 2025. [AFP]

Former president Nicolas Sarkozy was on Thursday set to become France's first postwar leader to go to prison after a court jailed him for five years over a scheme for the late Libyan dictator Moamer Kadhafi to fund his victorious 2007 presidential run.

The court convicted him on charges of criminal conspiracy, although it acquitted him of corruption and personally accepting illegal campaign financing.