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Carla Bruni-Sarkozy has been summoned for possible indictment in the investigation into the retraction of a key witness who initially accused her husband, Nicolas Sarkozy, of financing his 2007 presidential campaign with Libyan funds, according to media reports.
Franco-Lebanese businessman Ziad Takieddine had claimed to have delivered three suitcases containing a total of €5 million in cash in 2006 and 2007 to help finance Sarkozy’s campaign. But in 2020, Takieddine suddenly retracted his incriminating testimony, raising suspicions that Sarkozy may have pressured the witness to change his mind.
A person close to the case told AFP on Saturday that Bruni could face charges of concealing witness tampering, criminal conspiracy to prepare organized trial fraud and bribery of Lebanese judicial personnel. The model, singer and former première dame has already been questioned twice by French anti-corruption investigators, first as a witness in June 2023, then as a suspect last month.
The former president was charged in October on suspicion of authorizing the maneuvers. In April, his lawyers filed a motion to annul this measure and, more recently, a request to transfer the investigation.
Elements of the probe reported by AFP and Le Parisien indicate that the suspicions of the investigators against Bruni have been strengthened since they found a phone belonging to the former head of several paparazzi companies, Michèle “Mimi” Marchand, who was accused in the case in 2021. According to the judge, Marchand used this phone to send messages to the former presidential couple and played a role in the false retraction of Takieddine.
