New leaks of phone calls add to Nicolas Sarkozy graft scandal
PUBLISHED : Sunday, 13 July, 2014, 6:32am
UPDATED : Sunday, 13 July, 2014, 6:32am
Agence France-Presse in Paris
Nicolas Sarkozy is embroiled in six funding and bribery cases. Photo: Reuters
A corruption scandal surrounding former French president Nicolas Sarkozy deepened yesterday with fresh leaks of telephone conversations purporting to show he offered to get a judge a plum job in return for favours.
Sarkozy, who was charged two weeks ago with corruption and influence peddling in a case related to his campaign to win the presidency in 2007, claims he is the victim of a set-up.
But according to extracts from tapped calls published by the French daily Le Monde yesterday, the ex-president appeared to lobby for a job for the judge in Monaco in return for his help on one of six bribery and funding scandals in which Sarkozy is embroiled.
In intercepted mobile-phone calls with his long-time lawyer Thierry Herzog - who also faces charges - Sarkozy is alleged to have said, "I will help him [the judge] … I will get him set up," adding, "Call him today and tell him I will sort it out. I am going to Monaco and I will see the prince [Albert]."
The conversations are alleged to have taken place in February this year on a mobile phone the 59-year-old politician bought using a false name.
Sarkozy's lawyer Pierre Haik declined to comment.
The senior magistrate at the centre of the case, Gilbert Azibert, has been charged with illegally passing on information about a long-running political funding scandal involving L'Oreal heiress Liliane Bettencourt.
Azibert did not get the position in Monaco, a principality that is largely dependent on France, and has applied to retire.
In another alleged extract, Sarkozy told his lawyer to tell the judge that he was meeting that day with Monaco's minister of state (prime minister), Michel Roger, and would keep him informed of how it went.
But according to the newspaper, the authorities believe Sarkozy discovered that his "secret" phone was being tapped and subsequently decided not to ask for the job for the judge.
It claimed Roger confirmed to police that Sarkozy had talked to him on the day the conversation was taped but had not brought up Azibert or his desire to head up the principality's judiciary.
