guardian.co.uk,
Angelique Chrisafis in Paris, Thursday 22 September 2011
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| French president Nicolas Sarkozy's best man has been charged in an arms sales corruption scandal. Photograph: Emmanuel Dunand/AFP/Getty Images |
Nicolas Sarkozy's battle for re-election has been overshadowed by a major corruption
scandal after two of his closest friends were charged by judges investigating
alleged kickbacks on arms sales to Pakistan.
The
investigation, known as the "Karachi affair", is the biggest French
corruption scandal since the second world war, Sarkozy's political opponents
said.
It is a
potentially murderous saga of alleged illegal party funding, suitcases stuffed
with banknotes, rightwing political rivalry and, ultimately, the deaths of 15
people in a bomb attack in Pakistan.
Nicolas
Bazire, one of Sarkozy's closest friends and best man at his wedding to Carla
Bruni in 2008, was charged on Thursday with misuse of public funds. He is
suspected of taking kickbacks from the sale of submarines to Pakistan in the
1990s. Bazire, a former political aide who is now a director of French luxury
goods group LVMH, was detained by police and his home and office were searched.
Thierry
Gaubert, another friend and adviser to Sarkozy for many years, was also charged
and placed under investigation on suspicion that he carried cash from kickbacks
into France in suitcases.
Judges are
investigating whether kickbacks from arms sales were used to illegally fund the
failed presidential campaign of former rightwing prime minister Edouard Balladur
in 1995. Sarkozy was Balladur's budget minister as well as spokesman for his
campaign, which was run by Bazire. Lawyers for Bazire and Gaubert denied any
involvement. The Élysée Palace issued a statement that said Sarkozy "never
exercised the slightest authority in the campaign financing".
Sarkozy,
who faces a presidential election in seven months, is under pressure as judges
investigating the Karachi affair close in on his inner circle. A separate
judicial inquiry is already looking at whether Sarkozy or his party members
took cash from the billionaire L'Oréal heiress Liliane Bettencourt for illegalparty funding.
When he was
elected in 2007, Sarkozy had promised an "irreproachable" France,
presenting himself as a leader who would clean up corrupt French politics. This
is now being ridiculed by the left. Sarkozy has not yet officially declared his
candidacy in next year's election, but he has been positioning himself to run,
trying to create a more presidential image through his involvement in world
affairs, in Libya and the Middle East.
The Karachi
saga goes beyond illegal party funding. In May 2002, a bomb attack on a bus in
the city killed 15 people including 11 workers for a French naval defence
company on their way to the dockyard to work on submarines that had been sold
to Pakistan. French judges now believe it was a retaliation attack over unpaid
government bribes. A top investigating judge has opened a fresh examination
into a possible connection to kickbacks and party funding despite efforts by
the state prosecutor to stop the inquiry.
The arrest
of Sarkozy's friends follows another surprising twist. Two ex-wives involved in
bitter and difficult divorce battles with key figures came forward and gave
evidence to judges. An influential Franco-Lebanese arms broker and businessman,
Zied Takieddine, was last week charged with fraud over two arms contracts with
Pakistan and Saudi Arabia in which he was allegedly the middleman. His ex-wife
had testified to investigators. Then the trail led to Gaubert, whose ex-wife, a
granddaughter of the last king of Italy, told judges of several trips to
Switzerland in 1994 and 1995 when he returned with "voluminous suitcases
full of banknotes".
Yet another
sleaze inquiry was opened last week into assertions by one of Sarkozy's Africa
experts that the former president Jacques Chirac and prime minister Dominique
de Villepin were handed briefcases of cash from African leaders to fund
election campaigns. A Chirac adviser had claimed that Sarkozy also benefited.
All have denied taking cash.
Related Article:
French left captures Senate in setback for Sarkozy
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The French Socialists are savouring
their historic|
victory over the conservatives |
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