All language subtitles for Personne.n.y.comprend.rien.2025.FRENCH.1080p.WEB.H264-LiHDL

This film was made
at a specific point in time:

during the ongoing
"Sarkozy-Gaddafi" trial

at the special judicial
court in Paris.

Our role is not to establish
anyone's guilt.

We are not judges.

Only a court of law can examine

incriminating and
exculpatory evidence

and determine
whether a crime has been committed.

All individuals
mentioned in this film

are presumed innocent.

The ambitious man
has as many masters

as there are people
useful to his fortune.

It's October 20, 2011,
on the outskirts of Sirte,

in Libya.

These are the final images
of Colonel Gaddafi's life.

The death of the dictator
who ruled Libya for 40 years

marked the end of a war

that plunged the country
into political chaos

and a cycle of devastating violence
that continues to this day.

The war was conducted
under UN authority,

but was promoted by
one country in particular, France,

and the determination of one man,

its president at the time,

Nicolas Sarkozy.

Even as the bombs were falling,

two journalists

launched an extraordinary
investigation.

It lasted over ten years,

and gradually revealed
both the extent of relations

between Muammar Gaddafi
and Nicolas Sarkozy,

and how different they were
from the official version.

August 16, 2023 interview in
Le Figaro Magazine:

"The French people can't even say
what I'm accused of.

"No one can make sense of it."

Sarkozy - Gaddafi:
the Scandal of All Scandals

"Maybe some article gets written,
but that doesn't matter.

"Why doesn't it matter?

"Because then there's
another article,

"and then another one

"that says the opposite,
and no one can make sense of it."

A Mysterious Email

During the first half of 2011,

an email arrived at Mediapart,

from an unknown source who wrote:

"I have something
that might interest you

"concerning someone
you're writing about."

We didn't yet know
what that something was.

The person we were writing about

was what's known politely
in political and business circles

as an intermediary.

If you're being nice,
you might say a wheeler-dealer.

Less nice, as the law sometimes is:

an agent of corruption.

That man was Ziad Takieddine.

The email got our attention,

but required
my colleague Karl Laske and I

to travel to a foreign country

to see what kind of documents
were being offered.

And we found ourselves looking at
Ziad Takieddine's digital archives.

Back in the Mediapart offices,
Fabrice and I

started examining
the archives we'd obtained.

It was a hard drive

with several thousand
documents on it.

It had his tax forms,

photographs of his holidays
with politicians,

and every deal he had handled
in the previous ten years.

There were details
about Libyan dossiers,

Syrian dossiers, Saudi dossiers.

His real estate holdings
were documented,

since, as an intermediary,

he had properties just
about everywhere,

in London, France,
the French Riviera.

There was even his own appraisal
of his assets:

97 million euros.

To understand Ziad Takieddine's role
in the affair,

you need to go quite
far back in time.

His name first appeared
in the French news

in the context of a sensational
political-financial scandal:

the so-called "Karachi Affair".

In the mid-1990s,

Ziad Takieddine, born into

the upper echelons
of Lebanese society,

acted as an intermediary

in a gigantic sale
of French submarines

to the Pakistani government.

Ziad Takieddine
received colossal commissions,

part of which returned to France

during the presidential campaign
of Edouard Balladur,

who, in 1995,

had decided to run against
the designated right-wing candidate,

Jacques Chirac.

That same year, a young mayor

who had just been appointed
budget minister,

decided to join Balladur's camp

and became the spokesman
for his campaign.

A certain Nicolas Sarkozy.

But the Balladur clan's hopes
were short-lived

because Jacques Chirac
won the election.

Ziad Takieddine's name
remained in the background,

but we know that Chirac interrupted
the commission networks

because he realized that the money

had been used for
the Balladur campaign

and that considerable fraud
had been committed

around those arms contracts.
So he interrupted them.

That was a story Mediapart
reported on a lot,

and about
which we revealed a great deal.

And we believed...

how to put this...

that Ziad Takieddine's
corruption saga,

as understood by the courts,

was limited to that time period,

from 1993 to 1995,

and to his relations
with countries like

Pakistan and Saudi Arabia.

On May 8, 2002,

an attack in Karachi, Pakistan,

killed 14 employees
of the naval dockyards,

including 11 French engineers
working on the submarines.

To this day,
the courts continue to question

whether the attack
was retaliation for

the non-payment of
certain commissions.

Mr. President, I'm with the AFP.

According to information
reported yesterday,

following a meeting
between plaintiffs

in the Karachi bombing case

and the investigating magistrates,

there's talk of kickbacks to fund
Edouard Balladur's 1995 campaign.

As budget minister,

were you aware of
any such agreements?

There's no point asking
a question like that from my right.

Listen, that's ridiculous.

Frankly, it's ridiculous.

So Mr. Balladur accepted kickbacks
for his campaign

that never got paid,
and then a bomb in Karachi?

Let's respect the
pain of the victims.

Who could believe such a tall tale?

If there's a robbery
in Brussels today,

I was here!

Undeniable.

Mr. President?

Sorry, I'm not laughing,
because Karachi

is the pain of the families

and all that stuff.

But what am I supposed
to say to that?

From Karachi to Gaddafi

After Jacques Chirac's victory,

the whole Balladur clan
was sidelined from political life.

Their crossing of the desert
lasted seven years.

It only came to an end

when Jacques Chirac
was re-elected in May 2002.

Needing to close ranks on the right,

Chirac's second term

saw some Balladur
faithful return to favor.

Among them was Nicolas Sarkozy,
who joined the government.

Pardon me.

Nicolas Sarkozy became
minister of the interior,

and Ziad Takieddine,

who had a magnificent
mansion in Paris,

near the Place du Trocadéro,

organized a sumptuous party

to celebrate the return to power
of the Balladur loyalists,

in particular Nicolas Sarkozy.

In early 2011,

when at Mediapart

we gained access to
Ziad Takieddine's

digital archives,

it was like a digital
Ali Baba's cave.

It helped us understand
that Ziad Takieddine -

who we thought was a man
of a clan and an era -

meaning the presumed
agent of corruption

selling arms for the
Balladur government

from 1993 to 1995 -

was in fact a continuity,
a shadow element

in a chapter in the history
of the French right

that lasted for decades.

In 2002, now France's top cop,

Nicolas Sarkozy
was all over the media.

Have you had enough
of all these punks?

And very quickly showed
his true ambition.

When you're shaving in the morning,

you can think beyond
the Interior Ministry.

Maybe about the
presidential election?

Not only while shaving.

Nicolas Sarkozy needed
his own network to rise to power,

and one might reasonably suspect

that he needed
his own sources of funding.

And that's how Ziad
Takieddine showed up

on the radar of the Sarkozy team.

As we delved deeper
into the documents

that we came
to call the "Takieddine files",

we saw a story starting to emerge

about the political, diplomatic,

and economic history
between two countries,

France and Libya,

then ruled by dictator
Muammar Gaddafi.

That story did not
seem to correspond

to the official version,

the one the public knew,

of the relationship
between the two countries.

All the more so when
Nicolas Sarkozy,

then minister of the interior,

decided to run for president

and then became the
French head of state

in 2007.

Trips to Libya

Takieddine called himself
the "door opener",

so he tried to open doors.

He'd say:
"I open the doors to a country,

"which is why I should get paid."

And so he "opened
the door" to Libya.

Since Gaddafi came to power in 1969,

his Libya,

which claimed to be
socialist and pan-Africanist,

was more or less
openly at war with the West,

particularly
the United States and France.

In 1976, Muammar Gaddafi wrote his
universal revolutionary theory,

The Green Book, advocating
power for the people

with Islam was confined
to a purely religious role.

Former French diplomat in Tripoli

Author of In the Heart
of Gaddafi's Libya

Libya was the first Arab country
to nationalize its oil reserves.

It was one of Gaddafi's
first acts in 1969.

He kicked out the multinationals.

So he asserted his sovereignty
first by nationalizing oil and gas

and then by closing
British and American military bases

that had been there since 1943.

That's a partial explanation

for the persistent confrontation
with the imperialist powers,

because Gaddafi defined himself

as an anti-colonialist
and anti-imperialist.

At least against what he saw
as Western imperialism.

After the American bombing
of Tripoli in 1986,

the isolated Libyan state

pursued a policy
of deadly terrorist attacks

which led to its banishment
from the international community.

But in hopes of ending
the embargo against his country,

at the turn of the millennium,

the dictator declared

that he would renounce
both terrorism

and his nuclear weapons program.

I would place the end

of the "state
terrorism" era in 2001.

September 11, 2001,

was a real turning
point for Gaddafi.

He realized that the
world had changed,

that the American response
would be merciless,

and that he could
be next on the list

of terrorist states.

From 2003, with UN sanctions lifted,

Libya became the new El Dorado

for industrialists

from around the world.
Mainly Westerners, but not only.

So there was a real craze

for resuming trade relations

in every sector,
including security and the military.

And that's when Ziad Takieddine

really came into the picture.

He was the one who
took the first steps

in the Gaddafi-Sarkozy affair,
if I can call it that.

He made the first connections

and explored possibilities -
including, of course

since that's what
interested him most -

for secret commissions
and dark money.

We uncovered trade
and financial documents

that show a parallel diplomacy.

Ziad Takieddine was an agent
of secret diplomacy

to Libya.

It wasn't philanthropy,

he had a financial interest.

So he undertook trade negotiations

on a whole host of economic grounds,

from the sale of espionage equipment

to the sale of crude oil and more
with the Libyan dictatorship.

In Takieddine's archives,
we discovered

that his first contact,

and his main contact in Libya,

was Abdullah Senussi.

For 30 years,
Abdullah Senussi was involved

in the darkest and most dangerous
side of the regime.

He was the man who organized

the terrorist attacks
carried out by Libya in the 1980s.

One of the most deadly attacks
by the Libyan government

took place on September 19, 1989,

against a plane operated by
the French airline UTA.

The flight from Brazzaville to Paris
exploded over the Ténéré desert,

killing all 170 people on board.

The investigation revealed
that the attack,

ordered by Colonel
Gaddafi's government,

was planned by Abdullah Senussi.

Abdullah Senussi
was Gaddafi's brother-in-law.

He belonged to a very large tribe
in the south, the Magarha,

which was allied
with Gaddafi's tribe

and is very influential
in southern Libya.

He's really...

the classic example
of someone who had both

family and tribal legitimacy.

He was the epitome of the henchman.

He knew everything.

He handled all the sordid affairs,

and he was behind the
terrorist attacks.

He was a pillar of the regime.

In 1999,

Abdullah Senussi was sentenced
in France

to life imprisonment

for having masterminded the attack
on the UTA airlines DC-10.

An international arrest warrant
was issued for him.

It's dizzying that Takieddine

was in contact with Abdullah Senussi

because it meant he was in contact

with the most
dangerous man in Libya,

a man convicted by France.

He was absolutely
not to be associated with,

by any political leader.

But he would be associated with,

indirectly at first,
by Claude Guéant

and by Nicolas Sarkozy's team.

Claude Guéant, a former prefect

and previous head of
the French police,

was chosen by Nicolas Sarkozy
as his chief of staff

when he became
interior minister in 2002.

Guéant, a man as
level-headed and discreet

as Sarkozy is impulsive
and talkative,

became the conductor
of the Sarkozy machine.

They would work together
for nearly two decades.

We each have a specific role,

but we're used to working together.

No one takes offense
if one has ideas

about the other's sphere.

It was Ziad Takedienne who organized

a visit by Claude Guéant,

chief of staff to
Minister of the Interior

Nicolas Sarkozy,

in late September 2005.

It was a preparatory visit
during which Claude Guéant

worked with the Libyan authorities

to prepare Nicolas Sarkozy's
visit the following week

to Tripoli, the Libyan capital,

to meet the leader, Colonel Gaddafi,

who'd been dictator of the country
since the late 1960s.

That preparatory
visit by Claude Guéant

was very important

because in his notes,

Ziad Takieddine wrote that
it had to be secret,

that neither
the Foreign Affairs Ministry,

nor Jacques Chirac,
nor Dominique de Villepin

could know anything about it.

The note indicates
the safeguards that were taken.

Guéant was warned
that it was essential

for the visit to remain secret,

and the note also states:
"It'll be easier

to talk about the other subject."

That other question was very likely
the financing of Sarkozy's campaign.

Claude Guéant, the chief of staff
of the interior minister,

and therefore of the French police
and domestic intelligence services,

met in secret,
in Tripoli in late September 2005,

the terrorist Abdullah Senussi.

It was a secret, behind the back
of the French diplomatic corps.

The French ambassador and diplomats
in Tripoli were unaware of it.

He met him without a bodyguard,

though with one other man,
Ziad Takieddine,

who served as an interpreter between
Abdullah Senussi and Claude Guéant.

One week after his chief of staff's
preparatory visit,

Nicolas Sarkozy went to Tripoli.

It was a whirlwind one-day trip.

Thank you for hosting
us during Ramadan.

Officially, the interior minister -
who has no diplomatic mandate -

had come to discuss issues
related to migratory flows

and terrorism.

But officials present
were surprised by

an unusual and lengthy tête-à-tête

between the two men,

off camera,

and with only their
interpreter present.

In fact, it was the beginning
of a Faustian pact

between Nicolas Sarkozy
and Muammar Gaddafi.

Gaddafi was aware of
Sarkozy's ambition

to become president of France

because Ziad Takieddine
had told him about it,

as the notes
in the Takieddine files show.

And he offered to
help Nicolas Sarkozy

win power in France.

It was a traditional practice
in the Gaddafi system

to compensate your guests,

to compensate armed groups
or leaders you want to support,

and perhaps candidates for positions

or elected office in
foreign countries.

So it was a common practice
in the Gaddafi system.

Gaddafi saw Nicolas
Sarkozy as a new player.

I think he rather liked him,

so he wanted to do the right thing,
to restart the relationship

with a new president.

On that day,

Muammar Gaddafi
asked Nicolas Sarkozy

for a gesture from France

to improve Abdullah Senussi's
legal situation.

Muammar Gaddafi
asked Nicolas Sarkozy

to find a legal solution,

maybe even to get the arrest warrant
against Abdullah Senussi lifted.

Sarkozy knew that
Senussi's situation

wasn't just a personal issue
for Senussi.

It was a state issue for Libya.

Gaddafi's regime was personal,
but he was also a "weak dictator",

meaning he was
dependent on networks.

He controlled the tribes,

but he was also
controlled by the tribes.

And by his family.
There were tensions within the clan.

So he was torn
by those different interests.

And Abdullah Senussi
could talk to everyone in the clan.

So it was particularly important

with regard to honor, to image,

and for internal balance
within the regime,

that Gaddafi obtain
a kind of amnesty

for such an eminent
figure in the regime.

We discovered that,

only one and a half months

after Nicolas Sarkozy's
trip to Libya,

his personal attorney and friend,

the famous Paris
lawyer Thierry Herzog,

travelled to Libya.

In late November 2005,

he met with Abdullah Senussi's
criminal defense team.

The discussion was about ways

the arrest warrant
could be gotten rid of.

We know this through considerable
material evidence,

notably a report of
the meeting in Libya

between Senussi's men

and Nicolas Sarkozy's lawyer,

who would also become

Abdullah Senussi's
lawyer for a time.

On December 22, 2005, precisely,

a close friend of Sarkozy,
Brice Hortefeux,

then French minister
for local authorities,

went in turn

to Tripoli, the capital of Libya.

Known as the most
faithful of the faithful,

Brice Hortefeux was
Nicolas Sarkozy's

longest-serving lieutenant.

His loyalty was rewarded
with an appointment, in June 2005,

as minister delegate
for local authorities

under the authority of
Nicolas Sarkozy.

Like Claude Guéant
three months earlier,

Brice Hortefeux met secretly
with Abdullah Senussi in Tripoli,

in exactly the same circumstances:

without diplomats present,

without informing the embassy,

without a bodyguard,

without a translator,

but always with the same man,

the wheeler-dealer intermediary

and alleged agent of corruption,

Ziad Takieddine.

And that day, according
to two of the three people present,

Ziad Takieddine and
Abdullah Senussi,

this time the discussion was about
financing from Gaddafi's Libya

to Sarkozy's team

for the 2007 presidential election.

Guéant: "I had no specific knowledge
of Abdullah Senussi's situation

"and didn't know
I was going to meet him."

Hortefeux: ‶I didn't know
the details of his conviction

"and was totally unaware of
the international arrest warrant.″

Asked about his meeting
with Senussi's representatives,

Thierry Herzog did not reply,

claiming ‶attorney-client
privilege″.

Hortefeux and Guéant
claim ‶traps″ were set for them,

one each, three months apart.

Nicolas! Nicolas!

In early 2007,

Nicolas Sarkozy,
who had become leader

of the UMP party two years earlier,

launched his presidential campaign.

Breaking with tradition,

Nicolas Sarkozy was thinking big,
and ran an American-style campaign.

It was a time of
virtuous declarations.

A democracy beyond reproach
is a president

who says beforehand
all he plans to do,

and, above all, does afterwards
everything he said he'd do before.

That is democracy beyond reproach.

I want France to
defend human rights.

I believe it deep down.

I don't want and don't believe in
what's known as realpolitik,

which leads you to
abandon your values

without winning a single contract.

I won't to be an accomplice

to any dictatorship anywhere.

With such powerful statements,

on May 6, 2007,

Nicolas Sarkozy was elected to be

the sixth president of
the Fifth Republic.

Across the Mediterranean,
the congratulations were warm,

full of hope and promise.

Transcript of a phone call

12 days after Nicolas
Sarkozy was elected

Gaddafi: Hello, Mr. President.

Congratulations again on winning
the confidence of the French people.

Sarkozy: Hello, Mr. Guide.

I retain a wonderful memory
of the quality of your analysis.

Gaddafi: We are reassured to have
a friend in Europe now.

Sarkozy: Who should I meet with
to discuss sensitive issues?

Is it Mr. Bashir?

Gaddafi: Yes, Bashir.

You can reach an
agreement directly...

Sarkozy: Right, Mr. Guide.

I'll meet with Mr. Bashir
and find an agreement with him.

Gaddafi: Goodbye, Mr. President.

Sarkozy: Goodbye, Mr. Guide.
I'm counting on your prayers.

I don't pray the same way you do,
but we pray to the same god.

A few days later,

Muammar Gaddafi offered
the new French president

the release of five Bulgarian nurses
and a Palestinian doctor

who'd been jailed in Libya
for several years.

Their ordeal had moved
international opinion.

And so an official French plane

landed in Bulgaria on July 24, 2007,

returning the prisoners to freedom.

But surprise,

the event was also a marital one.

Cécilia Sarkozy,
the president's wife,

had been entrusted by
him with working out

the last details of their release.

I wanted to tell
you how happy we are

about the end of this long ordeal

endured by five women.

You'll also understand

that I want to congratulate Cécilia
for her remarkable job.

A short but nonetheless
sincere statement.

Barely 24 hours later,

Nicolas Sarkozy flew to Libya.

The new French president

devoted his first official visit
to the guide of the revolution,

Colonel Gaddafi.

The French president
and the Libyan dictator

were enjoying a public honeymoon.

The high point of their friendship
would come six months later:

Muammar Gaddafi's
official visit to France.

On December 10, 2007,

Muammar Gaddafi's plane
landed at Orly airport.

For the first time in 35 years,

the former godfather of terrorism

received a prestigious welcome

in a major Western capital.

Diplomatic practice in France is for
official visits to last three days.

Muammar Gaddafi asked to extend his
for three more.

And so for six days,

the dictator,
who pitched his Bedouin tent

in the gardens of the Republic,

crisscrossed Paris from
one tourist destination to another.

Gaddafi the tourist
is having a whale of a time.

Bateaux-mouches, Eiffel Tower,

30 minutes at the Louvre,
including three with the Mona Lisa,

an hour at Versailles,
a dream for his Amazonian guard...

He's been to Versailles,
to the Louvre.

His clothes and schedule change,

but one thing is constant:
the traffic jams.

Sister of Jean-Pierre Klein,
victim of the DC-10 attack

Founder of the
Association of Terrorism Victims

For us, and for me particulary,

it was a grotesque period.

We had no idea what was going on.
It was insane.

The tent,

Paris shut down, Versailles,

Gaddafi in the cold weather
with his fur coat and hat.

It was incomprehensible to us.

The pomp and circumstance deployed

for the dictator
shocked public opinion

and scandalized deputies
in the National Assembly,

as well as some members
of the government.

The defuse the controversy,

the indispensable Claude Guéant
was sent to the front.

Has Colonel Gaddafi reformed enough

to justify such a
reception in France,

one that no other
major Western nation

has yet granted him?

He was welcomed as are

all other heads of
state visiting France.

But the efforts of
the chief of staff

to the French president

did not quell the controversy
that was growing by the day.

To silence the carping,

Nicolas Sarkozy played his joker.

It's all very well the talk
and posturing about human rights

at the Café de Flore
and the Zenith arena.

Gone was the criticism
of realpolitik

winning out over values.

I'll be signing tens of billions
in contracts

with our Libyan counterparts.

It's about French jobs and growth.

And he staged for the press,

with Muammar Gaddafi's
jovial complicity,

the signing of contracts with Libya
for a stated value of

a total of 10 billion euros.

There was talk of
billions in contracts

that would fill France's coffers

and provoke a tidal wave of growth
in the French economy.

Almost no one believed it.

For us, the victims of the DC-10,

the most unbelievable
was the invitation

from Sarkozy,

because he did the inviting.

The pomp,
all the time spent with him,

the impression
that Gaddafi was everywhere,

and that we couldn't
get away from him.

We couldn't make sense of it.

In the end,

Nicolas Sarkozy,
the French president,

accepted us at -
or rather invited us to -

the Elysée Palace on
the last day Gaddafi was in Paris,

to meet us and talk to us.

That meeting was quite incredible

when you think back on it,

but at the time it
calmed us in a way.

Nicolas Sarkozy took the time
to listen to us.

And I remember him saying,
more than once:

"You're wonderful people."

And we took it at face value.

And we needed to.

Nicolas Sarkozy had
just been elected,

a young president,

and he received families
affected by a terrorist attack.

And now we discover
that the same man

had been elected thanks to money

received from the people who killed

our brothers, sisters,
mothers, families.

In hindsight,
if what is coming to light now,

what we know from the investigation,

proves to be true,

that moment
when he received the families

makes it even worse.

Nicolas Sarkozy gave Muammar Gaddafi
what he wanted most,

and what he was prepared
to pay dearly for:

for Libya to become
a respectable country again,

one that a great
democracy like France,

home of the Declaration
of the Rights of Man,

can talk to.

The man who made that possible

for Muammar Gaddafi
was Nicolas Sarkozy.

As his official visit to France
was drawing to a close,

Colonel Gaddafi could never

have known that,
just four years later,

his relationship
with the French president

would change abruptly.

The Warmonger

During the wave of Arab Spring
popular revolts

that began in Tunisia,

riots broke out in Benghazi,
in eastern Libya,

in February 2011.

It was the beginning of a civil war.

To the surprise of all,

Nicolas Sarkozy

was the first head
of state to receive

and recognize
the opponents of Colonel Gaddafi

as the only legitimate
power in Libya.

And just four years after hosting
Muammar Gaddafi with great fanfare,

the French president began
a diplomatic offensive

to obtain
UN Security Council authorization

for a military
intervention in Libya.

We have a job to do within
a very specific legal framework,

that of the United Nations:

avoid deaths.

That was the context

in which Muammar Gaddafi
made the rather strange statement

that if Nicolas Sarkozy
bombed his country,

he could reveal "an
important secret".

That secret was revealed
a few days later

by one of the dictator's sons,

Saif al-Islam.

When asked about France's eagerness
to intervene in Libya militarily,

to content
of his statement was explosive.

First of all,
Sarkozy should return the money

he accepted from Libya
to fund his campaign.

We financed his campaign,
and we have the proof.

We can reveal everything.

We demand that the clown

return that money to
the Libyan people.

It provoked
very little political comment.

People imagined it was one of
the dictator's final boasts.

Since it was made at
the start of a war

and by a regime dignitary,

we interpreted it with caution.

Nevertheless, we're journalists.

At Mediapart,
we had the digital archives

of Ziad Takieddine

that provided us with
specific elements

with which to understand
the reality of Franco-Libyan history

from the early 2000s,

a reality that did not correspond
to the official narrative

provided by France
under Nicolas Sarkozy.

The documents showed

that the narrative
wasn't quite accurate,

and many factual elements

in Takieddine's archives
corroborated the idea

of the possible
corruption of the future

French president by the dictator.

A patient effort of verification

enabled us,
by the summer of 2011,

to publish a first round of articles

revealing a relationship -
initially incomprehensible -

between Nicolas Sarkozy
and Muammar Gaddafi.

The Dirty Truth of Sarkozy-ism

"Takieddine Affair:
Arms Merchant's Assets Frozen"

"Takieddine Documents:

Sarkozy Emissary
Secretly Paid by Total"

On March 18, 2011,

a UN resolution established
a no-fly zone, prohibiting Gaddafi

the use of his air force.

It was immediately interpreted
by France and its supporters

as an authorization to bomb
the Libyan armed forces.

Thus began a war that
even the Americans

called "Nicolas Sarkozy's war".

There are questions
about the war in Libya

that are still unanswered today.

Among those unanswered questions

is the choice by France to undertake
certain bombing raids.

For example, in August 2011,

French planes bombed
Abdullah Senussi's private home

in a residential area of Tripoli,

killing at least one civilian.

Was Abdullah Senussi's home in

a residential area,
next to a school -

and where he was not even present -
a military objective?

"To suggest that France unilaterally
launched raids against a convoy,

"home, or any target

"is an absurdity

that does not stand
up to any analysis.

"The multinational staff of NATO
makes those decisions."

Although the war

was only supposed
to last a few days,

it took six months for Tripoli
to fall into rebel hands.

Gaddafi, on the run,
was nowhere to be found.

But two months later, his convoy,
identified by the Americans,

was bombed by French planes.

The dictator was captured

and assassinated
on October 20th near Sirte.

Do you have any reaction
to the death of Mr. Gaddafi?

The objective

is for Libya to regain its freedom

and hope for democracy.

Under the Rubble

The war left the country devastated,

divided among political factions
and Islamists,

and in a state of political chaos
that continues to this day.

And Muammar Gaddafi's
"important secret"

could have disappeared forever
under the rubble.

So the war ended,

notably with the death of Gaddafi.

His followers
were either dead or on the run.

We took several trips

to Cairo, to Tunisia.

We were looking to meet members
of the former regime,

hoping to interiew them,

to see documents, and so on.

During our investigation,

we came across a document in 2012

that had escaped the bombing
during the war in Libya.

The document was signed

by a very important man
in the Libyan hierarchy,

a man named Moussa Koussa.

He had led the Libyan
foreign intelligence service.

The document laid out
how the authorities had agreed

to finance Nicolas
Sarkozy's campaign

to the tune of 50 million euros,

and that he, Koussa,

approved that decision
by the General People's Committee.

In short, it shows the intent

to finance Nicolas
Sarkozy's campaign.

The memo refers to a meeting
attended on the Libyan side

by Abdullah Senussi
and Bashir Saleh,

Muammar Gaddafi's chief of staff,

and on the French side by
Brice Hortefeux and Ziad Takieddine.

It reports that an
agreement was reached

on an amount the Libyan regime
was prepared to contribute

to Nicolas Sarkozy's campaign.

When you're holding such a document,

it obviously burns your fingers.

But it's not because
it burned our fingers

and supported clues
we'd already gathered

that it was true.

So we had to verify the document.

We returned to Paris,
had it translated

a first time, then a second time.
We showed it to experts,

to authenticate the date,
the official stamps, etc.

We met a number of official sources,
French and Libyan,

who allowed us to formally confirm
the authenticity of the document.

Nicolas! Nicolas!

Nicolas Sarkozy was still unaware of

the ongoing evaluation
of the Koussa memo.

For him,
the war in Libya was already

a distant memory.

His attention was on
a new presidential campaign.

Running for re-election,

he held rally after sumptuous rally.

I'll be criticized
and I'll be attacked,

but I don't care because
I told the truth.

At the newspaper,

we were in a very
difficult situation.

The timing was very delicate
for us as journalists,

and made us very uneasy.

We had a large amount
of verified information.

And it was between the two rounds

of the election
Sarkozy was running in.

Should we publish or not?

As president, I will ensure

the justice system
operates independently.

As president,
I will ensure my behavior

is exemplary at all times.

Let me tell you,

the office of the president
is not a normal office.

But in fact,
the presidential campaign

obliged us to publish
the elements we had.

It was the moment of choice,

the moment when political positions
were being debated,

positions that included questions of
transparency, of financing...

So in a way,
that document entered fully

into the field
of the presidential debate.

"Sarkozy-Gaddafi: Proof of Funding"

Mediapart published
the Moussa Koussa

memo on April 28, 2012,

between the two rounds
of the presidential election.

Nicolas Sarkozy was
questioned publicly

for the first time

about the financing
of his 2007 campaign.

Last question before
opening to the audience:

Online sources affirm
that Colonel Gaddafi

financed your 2007 campaign.

Is that true?

If he did, I wasn't very grateful.

His son, Saif al-Islam,
claims you received money

from the Gaddafi family.

A moral reference, I'm sure.

I pity you for being a spokesperson
for Gaddafi's son.

When you quote Mr.
Gaddafi, his son -

Mr. Gaddafi is dead -

his son, who has blood on his hands,

part of a regime of dictators,

of murderers,
that has no credibility,

and when you give voice
to the questions he asked,

frankly,
I think that's going very low

in the political debate.

Very soon afterwards,

Nicolas Sarkozy denied it,

and announced that he would
lodge a complaint against us.

And he did in fact file a complaint
in the following days.

His response was very muscular,

and accused us of publishing
a fake document.

For three and a half years,

Mediapart had to wage a legal battle
against Nicolas Sarkozy,

and against Brice Hortefeux,
who joined the complaint,

to prove that we did our work well

and that the document
was not a forgery.

The justice system,

from the examining magistrates

to the appellate court

to the court of cassation,

which is the highest
court in France,

all of them, three times,
formally declared that the document

was not a forgery,

contrary to the claims
of Nicolas Sarkozy.

- It's a fake.
- Made by whom?

First, Mediapart lies all the time.

And what is Mediapart?
A tool.

- Of whom?
- You know very well. Of the left.

The document is a crude forgery.

Why do you say that?

Because the two people in Libya
who supposedly sent and received it

have refuted it.

Nicolas Sarkozy didn't limit himself

to repeating that the
document was fake.

He and his lawyers
quickly provided a denial

from one of Gaddafi's
closest associates,

Bashir Saleh,
the recipient of the Koussa memo.

Bashir Saleh was no stranger
to Nicolas Sarkozy.

Let us recall the conversation
between Muammar Gaddafi

and the newly-elected
president of France.

Transcribed phone call from
12 days after Sarkozy's election

Sarkozy: Who should I meet with
to discuss sensitive issues?

Is it Mr. Bashir?

Gaddafi: Yes, Bashir.

You can reach an
agreement directly...

Bashir Saleh was the man
Nicolas Sarkozy hugged

when he got off the plane in Tripoli

in July 2007.

During the war in Libya,

Bashir Saleh was arrested
by the Libyan rebels.

He was to stand trial,
accused of a number

of crimes and misdemeanors,

including embezzling
and corruptly spending

the public funds of
the Libyan people.

But while he was in the custody of
the new Libyan government,

the French secret services,
the DGSE,

organized his exfiltration.

In other words, we removed him

from the Libyan authorities
that we put in place

to enable him to escape justice
in his own country

and to reach France...

...where he was welcomed
by the Sarkozy clan.

He received
a temporary residence permit,

and was sheltered
until things settled down.

As the newspaper was under attack
by the Sarkozy clan,

the press discovered
that Bashir Saleh was in France,

protected by French authorities,

even as he was the target
of and Interpol arrest warrant.

That created a lot of confusion
in the executive branch,

which had to say both:

"Yes, he received a
residency permit",

and "But we'll look for him anyway."

Bashir Saleh denied
receiving the memo.

But he's wanted by Interpol

while living in France,

as confirmed by
Libération this morning.

- Can you confirm that?
- That's not quite accurate.

First, you say he's
wanted by Interpol,

but we have no trace
of an international

arrest warrant for Mr. Bashir Saleh.

The press affirmed it on Saturday.

Perhaps, but I presume the French
government would be aware of it.

What happened next?

It was between the
two election rounds,

and something happened that was
straight out of a film.

Once again, France

organized the exfiltration
of Bashir Saleh.

The scene revolved
around two characters:

the intermediary Alexandre Djouhri,

and Sarkozy's head
of domestic intelligence,

a man named Bernard Squarcini.

The two men met near
the Eiffel Tower

in early May 2012,

and discreetly organized -

via private jet -

the exfiltration, indeed the escape,
of Bashir Saleh,

even as he was wanted
under an Interpol red notice.

The Second Man in the Shadows

The man who exfiltrated Bashir Saleh

was the second intermediary
in the secret negotiations

between the Libyan dictatorship
and Nicolas Sarkozy's team.

A rival of Ziad Takieddine named

Alexandre Djouhri.

Though suspected in his youth
of belonging to criminal gangs,

albeit never convicted,

Alexandre Djouhri
deployed a gift of gab,

know-how, and a lot of nerve

to end up doing deals

among the French elite.

Initially linked to
Jacques Chirac's entourage,

he gradually grew closer to
Nicolas Sarkozy's clan.

Good evening, Alexandre Djouhri.

Good evening, David Pujadas.

Thank you for receiving us
here in London,

and for granting this interview.

For 30 years, you've been a
behind-the-scenes man,

a discreet, even secretive man,
mixing with heads of state

as well as major business figures.

In fact, how would you define
your profession?

You reject the term "intermediary".

Absolutely.

He was the second character

who participated,

on the French side,
in Nicolas Sarkozy's campaign.

You have Mediapart
explaining in an article

that there was financing
for the campaign

because a guy called Senussi,

who was sentenced in absentia
to life imprisonment

for the attack on the UTA DC-10,

and Saif Gaddafi,
apprentice dictator

with blood on his hands...

- The son...
- Yes, Gaddafi's son.

And a guy called Ziad Takieddine,
who you can't blame

because he's fit for the asylum.

Alexandre Djouhri had
a lot of contacts,

a network,

and in the police,
he had Bernard Squarcini.

Extract from a wiretap between

Alexandre Djouhri
and Bernard Squarcini

Hello.

Yeah, Bernard...

Yeah, Alex, how's it going?

- You didn't call me back?
- Oh, shit.

I was caught up at LVMH
and completely forgot. Sorry.

- Hello?
- Hi, Alex.

- Hi, Bernard.
- I'm waiting for an answer.

He still hasn't named
a date or anything.

He asked me 10 days ago
who I'm coming with,

and I said with
Nicolas and Claude's friend.

- When did you call him?
- Over the weekend. Yesterday.

Tell him it's urgent.

We really have to do this,
go on attack.

I get it, you silly jackass.

I get it, OK.

- Talk soon. Bye.
- Ciao.

"I have no business
relationship with him...

"But a guy like that, who mixes
with bigwigs, you've got to see him.

"He's the interesting piece
of the puzzle."

The Squarcini-Djouhri connection
is another highly problematic one.

Having the head of
domestic intelligence

in your pocket, or "with you",

when you're running
such operations is a big deal.

You have information
about your adversaries,

about what's going on
in various places.

It's a major intelligence service,

and Djouhri put the relationship
to good use

on many levels and
on many occasions.

You've reached Bernard Squarcini.
I'm not available right now.

Please leave a message and

I'll call you back
as soon as possible.

Commando Bernard, attack!
Call me back.

I'm in the starting blocks.

Following the
revelations by Mediapart,

Alexandre Djouhri
was questioned about

his role in exfiltrating
Bashir Saleh

between the two rounds
of the 2012 election.

Bashir Saleh is a gentleman

who had an appointment in Niger.

He told me: "I'm going to leave.

"I have a meeting,
and I'll be back."

I didn't know he wasn't coming back.

From Niger,
Bashir Saleh fled to South Africa.

Over the years,

he's been questioned regularly about

Libyan funding for
Sarkozy's campaign.

If I gave to Sarkozy,
I'd say I gave it.

We never gave money to Sarkozy.

I'm not the person
responsible for that

because my hands are empty.

In fact, Bashir Saleh

knows he owes his life
to Nicolas Sarkozy's France.

And for years, Bashir Saleh was
one of Nicolas Sarkozy's trump cards

in the Libyan financing scandal,

serving as a witness
for the defense.

Does the fact
that France helped you flee Libya

make you indebted
to Nicolas Sarkozy?

And is that why

you deny any possible funding
of his campaign by Libya?

In other words, do you owe him?

No, no.

I only tell the truth.

But over time, Bashir Saleh

became less and less
a witness for the former president.

And in late 2017,

with journalist Nicolas Vescovacci

on the program "Cash Investigation",

Bashir Saleh admitted
for the first time

that there had been financing
of Nicolas Sarkozy's campaign.

I think he gave money.

Senussi said he gave money
to Nicolas Sarkozy.

But with whom?
Not me! It's not my department.

Could it be a bank transfer
via an offshore company?

No one accepts transfers.

You think Sarkozy
would accept a transfer?

- So it could only be cash?
- Only cash.

And then, just as he was beginning
to change his position

on the affair,

Bashir Saleh was targeted
in an attack in South Africa.

He was shot by a gunman
while driving his car.

Miraculously, he survived,

despite being shot several times
in the torso.

Bashir Saleh's
somewhat distant revelations

didn't garner much attention.

But another character,
the one at the origin of this story,

made new statements
that resonated like thunderclaps.

Witness for the Prosecution

Yes, Mr. Sarkozy

was financed by Libya.

Yes, he is corrupt.

Yes, let him deny it.

Let Mr. Sarkozy deny it.

Ziad Takieddine felt abandoned
by Sarkozy's people.

He was abandoned by them,

even denounced by
Guéant in an interview.

He engaged in a test
of strength with

the Sarkozy team in
a rather public way.

I can tell you that I know very well

where everything is,

and I know very well when and how
it will come out.

Ziad Takieddine is a man
who came up alongside

part of the French right.

First Balladur's people,
then Sarkozy's.

He became very rich thanks to them,

but he was replaced at some point.

Mr. What's-his-name? Djouhri!

Complicit with Mr. Guéant!

Complicit in all the dirty deals
of this Republic.

When Ziad Takieddine's name

got a little too hot
for the political scene

due to its association
with the Karachi affair,

he experienced what many people
in his shoes experience:

he became a fuse

and he was blown.

But Ziad Takieddine was
one of those people who say:

"If I'm going down,
I'm not going alone."

- Was money paid out?
- Yes.

By whom?

By the Libyan authorities,
specifically Muammar Gaddafi.

- To whom?
- Nicolas Sarkozy and Claude Guéant.

- Directly?
- Directly.

How?

Via bank transfers and cash.

Ziad Takieddine's
thundering accusations

reached the ears of prosecutors,

and two years after
Mediapart published

its first articles about the affair,

the legal system decided
to take up the case

and open a criminal investigation.

The Law Gets Involved

Specialized police,
specialized prosecutors,

and specialized investigating
magistrates

tried in turn

to document the events.

They have the means

that the press obviously -
and fortunately! - does not.

And the investigation
patiently began to confirm

what Mediapart had been saying
for two years.

Investigators heard
a lot of testimony

and uncovered a number of documents

that not only confirmed

but even amplified
what we had started to expose

in the Sarkozy-Gaddafi affair.

From the outset of
the investigation,

the special officers
of the anti-corruption office

took an interest in Claude Guéant.

During a search of his home,

they discovered
in one of his bank accounts

traces of a 500,000 euro payment

originating in Malaysia.

The funds were paid in 2008,

3 months after Gaddafi's
visit to Paris.

Claude Guéant
immediately invested the money

in the purchase of an apartment
near the Eiffel Tower.

The former presidential
chief of staff

under Nicolas Sarkozy

claimed the payment

was for the sale of
two small canvases

by a Flemish painter.

It was a completely
banal transaction.

I simply sold
two paintings that I had acquired

some twenty years earlier,
and that's all.

Unfortunately,

Claude Guéant was unable to prove
he had ever owned the paintings.

The judges even spoke
of a "fictitious sale".

The paintings story was a flop,

and what's more,
the financial trail

was traced from the original account

to another account,
then a third one,

a fifth one...

The courts now suspect that
Alexandre Djouhri and Bashir Saleh

were behind the transaction.

That Libyan money,
found in the account

of one of Sarkozy's
closest collaborators,

provided the courts

with a rationale for
continuing to search

for traces of Libyan financing.

And another clue
reached the investigators.

To understand it,

we'll need to go back a few years.

April 29, 2012,

between the two rounds
of the election,

and less than 24
hours before Mediapart

published the Koussa memo.

That day,

the lifeless body of one of Libya's
greatest dignitaries,

former Minister of Oil
Shukri Ghanem,

was found floating
in the Danube in Vienna.

The Austrian police investigation

was very basic and concluded
the death was an accident.

Shukri Ghanem had been walking

in the middle of the night
and fell into the Danube

and drowned.

As it happens,
American intelligence officials

believe the death was suspicious

and that a crime was committed.

Four years after his death, in 2016,

a copy of Shukri Ghanem's
personal diaries

reached the desks
of the French investigators.

Among Shukri Ghanem's
handwritten notes

was one that's been authenticated

by several European police forces.

It was written in his diary

in April 2007.

In it, he reported
meeting with Bashir Saleh

and having "taken stock"
of the financing operations

for Nicolas Sarkozy.

"Saleh said he transferred
1.5 million to Sarkozy.

"Saif [al-Islam Gaddafi]
gave Sarkozy 3 million,

"and 2 million went
via Abdullah Senussi."

Shukri Ghanem wrote detailed notes,

indicating that several leaders
had contributed to the financing:

Bashir Saleh himself,

Saif al-Islam Gaddafi,

and Abdullah Senussi.

That handwritten note from
the Libyan minister of oil

revealed that,
following a political agreement,

Muammar Gaddafi had mandated
each of the three men

to contribute a share

to the financing
of Nicolas Sarkozy's campaign.

The document contradicted
one of Nicolas Sarkozy's arguments,

that "this Gaddafi-Libyan
financing business"

was made up by Gaddafi's people
during the war.

That argument
could have been legitimate.

Gaddafi loyalists
in the dictatorship

were panicking about
being overthrown,

so they accused France -

which was the country
most committed to the war -

of having been corrupted by them.
Basically, it was a smokescreen.

It's a theoretically
acceptable argument.

But if one of the leaders
of Gaddafi's regime

wrote in 2007

about payments

related to the
presidential election,

that completely
undermines that story.

They couldn't have known in 2007

that there would be a war
four years later.

The Gaddafi gang,

which is a gang of assassins -

the father,

the son,

the nephew,

the cousin,

the spokesman,

the mistress, the brother-in-law -

are heaping insults
and slander upon me.

When did it start?
The French people need to know.

On March 10, 2011,

I received Gaddafi's opponents,
the NTC,

at the Elysée Palace.

On March 11th,

Mr. Gaddafi stared talking about
financing my campaign.

Never before.

For four years,
he never said a word about it.

Nicolas Sarkozy's outraged denials

got more media coverage

than Shukri Ghanem's posthumous
revelations.

But Ziad Takieddine
would soon make new claims

about his role in the affair

that would violently upend

the former president's
defense strategy.

A suitcase like so.

It opens this way.

And the money's inside.

One day Mr. Sarkozy asked me
if I could

be the one who

could transport some of the money to

Claude Guéant from Interior.

I started thinking about
what I'd cover it with

to hide it, if there was space.

He said: "Don't worry,

"the services have been informed,

"so you can enter with it
and deliver it to Mr. Guéant."

What was in the suitcase, exactly?

Nothing other than money.

In the first one there was about
1.5 million.

Ziad Takieddine explained
that he transported, three times,

funds to the Interior Ministry

in November and December 2006
and January 2007.

They asked me because
they trusted me.

So I took it and delivered it.

He incriminated himself by saying:
"I, Ziad Takieddine,

"I picked up cash in Tripoli

"and I took it
to the Interior Ministry."

He spoke of three trips,
for a total of five million euros,

given to him by Abdullah Senussi,
him again,

to take to Paris,
to the ministry on Place Beauveau.

He was very precise and detailed
in his accounts.

He recounted the
scenes at the airport,

the bags,

the handovers -
twice to Claude Guéant,

and once,
he affirmed, to Nicolas Sarkozy.

Did Mr. Sarkozy know why
you were dropping off the suitcase?

Did he know what was inside?

Frankly, of course!

Claude Guéant,
who contests the events,

obtained a conviction for defamation

against Ziad Takieddine.

Nicolas Sarkozy chose to withdraw
just before the trial.

Mediapart was acquitted.

Ziad Takieddine's revelation
came alongside another one,

a sort of a posteriori
cross-checking:

the revelation of
Abdullah Senussi's deposition

before the International
Criminal Court.

Abdullah Senussi,
the planner of the DC-10 attack,

was arrested in March 2012
in Mauritania,

then extradited and
imprisoned in Libya.

Before the International
Criminal Court,

he claimed to have
personally supervised

the transfer of five million euros,

via Ziad Takieddine
and Claude Guéant,

to finance Nicolas Sarkozy's
presidential campaign.

It's exactly what Ziad Takieddine
accused himself of,

without knowing that
Abdullah Senussi

said the same thing

to the International Criminal Court.

Once again,
is that definitive proof?

No.

But it did constitute
a compelling body

of evidence for the
French legal system.

Confronted with the serious facts
established by the investigation,

Nicolas Sarkozy fought back
every inch of the way,

appealing to public opinion

and claiming an offense against
his status as former head of state.

A simple question about what
you mentioned last night:

did you or did you not
receive cash from Libya

to finance your 2007 campaign

as Ziad Takieddine claimed,

not only to the media,
but to French magistrates yesterday?

Such indignity.

On a public television station.

You talked about it
yourself yesterday.

You're not ashamed to quote a man
who's been in prison,

who's been convicted countless times
for defamation,

and who's a liar.

That is not how I think
of the public service media.

In the wake of those revelations,

the investigators starting looking
for cash all over the place.

In all of these major corruption,
influence-peddling,

and hidden political
financing cases,

one question always comes up,
that of the cash.

Why? Because it's always used
for a very understandable reason:

it leaves no trace.

The investigators looked
into the movement of cash

within the UMP and Les Républicains.

Why so much cash?

Evidence accumulated
about cash in a closet

at the HQ of Les Républicains.

It became clear that,
at the end of the campaign,

all of the bonuses and
end-of-contract payments

were paid in cash.

According to one
legal expert's report,

it came to the modest sum
of 250,000 euros.

Which means that at the very end
of the presidential campaign,

the campaign coffers
still contained,

in large denominations,

250,000 euros in cash.

That amount should
be taken as evidence

of the massive circulation

of cash during
the presidential campaign,

and an indication of
what may have been

circulating earlier.

But where did that money come from?

Campaign treasurer Eric Woerth
claimed the big denominations

were from anonymous donations
sent through the post office.

Where are the bank documents?

The transfers?

There are no documents,
no photos, no accounts.

There's no physical evidence.

There's only hatred,

mud,

mediocrity, spite, and slander.

The Hidden Friend

During the official investigation of
the Sarkozy-Gaddafi affair,

the magistrates discovered that

Ziad Takieddine had created
an offshore company,

as they're known,

that was called Rossfield Limited.

In February 2006,

there's a record of a payment

to an account labelled "Olin".

O-L-I-N.

At the same time,
in another legal inquiry,

police were looking into tax fraud

by a long-time collaborator
and friend of Nicolas Sarkozy,

Thierry Gaubert.

In 1988, Nicolas Sarkozy

officiated at the marriage
of Thierry Gaubert.

He was a close associate
in Neuilly local government,

and would later become
Sarkozy's deputy

chief of staff at
the Budget Ministry.

Thierry Gaubert, a close friend
of Ziad Takieddine,

was also implicated
in the Karachi affair

and sentenced in 2020

to four years in prison.

He has appealed the conviction.

It was revealed that he held several
undeclared accounts abroad,

in Switzerland and the Bahamas.

And then I remembered
that the village

in Columbia,

where, in 2011,
Karl and I discovered

Gaubert's sumptuous property
hidden away from the taxman,

is called Nilo, N-I-L-O.

Nilo is Olin spelled backwards.

And then I found a record

from February 2006

of a payment of 440,000 euros

from a company called
Rossfield Limited.

I thought, "This is incredible!"

It was exactly the same amount,
the same date,

and the same name
as Ziad Takieddine's company

that was used to transfer
the Libyan money.

For the first time,

we had a bank record
of a financial flow

that left the Gaddafi dictatorship

and arrived in the
account of someone

close to Nicolas Sarkozy in France.

It was unequivocal.

It went from Senussi to Takieddine

to Thierry Gaubert's account.

Thierry Gaubert,

like many others,
wrote little notes in his calendar.

We noticed that,
a day or two before the transfer,

he'd written "NS campaign".

For the investigators
and magistrates,

it was like an admission

that he was also involved

in Nicolas Sarkozy's
presidential campaign.

Note the following comment:
"Ns - campaign"

Thierry Gaubert
claimed he didn't know,

he forgot,

campaign could mean anything...

He tried to duck the question
in a ridiculous way,

since it's hard
to claim that "NS campaign"

had nothing to do with
Nicolas Sarkozy's campaign.

Gaubert denied involvement
in the campaign.

About the annotation, he said:

"It's a capital 'N'
and lowercase 's',

not capital 'N' capital 'S',

"so maybe it's not Nicolas Sarkozy.

'Campaign' could mean
lots of things."

So in December 2019,

we revealed in Mediapart

the missing link
in the Sarkozy-Gaddafi affair:

the payment of a half-million euros

from Senussi to Takieddine
and all the way to Thierry Gaubert.

The Gaubert-Senussi transfer
in the Libyan affair

was an event from
the legal point of view,

since Nicolas Sarkozy,
when questioned

in the media a few years earlier,

had very boastfully asserted

that "not a single bank transfer
has been uncovered!"

Where are the bank documents?
Where are the transfers?

It turns out that there was
at least one bank transfer,

for 440,000 euros,

demonstrating the existence of
a financial flow from Libya

into French pockets,
and not just any pockets,

but those of Nicolas Sarkozy's
hidden friend.

"I've had no personal
relationship with

Thierry Gaubert since 1996.

"What I'm telling you
is the absolute truth."

During searches, investigators found
many elements -

invitations, lunches,
gifts, meetings -

that in their view attested to

"relational continuity
out of proportion"

to what was claimed
by the former president.

On March 21, 2018,

after being held 48 hours
for questioning,

Nicolas Sarkozy was indicted
in the Libyan affair,

on charges of corruption,

receiving embezzled public funds,

and illicit financing
of an electoral campaign.

The former head of state

took the opportunity to denounce
a conspiracy by the judiciary.

It had been his go-to
defense strategy

for several years already.

Nicolas Sarkozy breaks his silence

in an editorial in
tomorrow's Le Figaro.

The former president, responding
to investigators' accusations,

compares the surveillance of himself

to Stasi practices in
former East Germany.

The best defense is a good offense.

Nicolas Sarkozy dips his nib
in exceptionally violent ink.

"Surveillance worthy

of the East German
Stasi and a dictator."

He presents himself
as wounded and angry...

Honorary Public Prosecutor
to the Court of Cassation

It's a constant
among today's politicians,

and the tactic sometimes pays off.

It consists of trying to discredit
the proceedings

by questioning

the integrity and motives
of the prosecuting attorney.

I've observed it now for 20 years.

I felt the situation
was serious enough

to tell the French people

the extent of

the political instrumentalization
of part of the judicial system.

Things are being organized,

and the French people need to know,

and with full freedom of conscience,

they need to judge for themselves.

I believe in the
honesty and sincerity

of magistrates

and public prosecutors.

I've always believed

that a good magistrate
has to be courageous,

and that courage is
an intrinsic virtue

required of a magistrate,

notably a good one.

Courage allows you to make decisions

that may not be popular.

I've sometimes had to make decisions
that politicians didn't like.

You do it anyway.

I am the victim of relentless attack

and of a justice system
instrumentalized

to destroy me
and keep me out of politics,

in the same way and
at the same time.

The French are no fools,
they can see

that it's all to weaken
Nicolas Sarkozy.

In order to function,
democracy needs -

whether it makes
everyone happy or not -

it needs a strong legal system,

one that's independent,

that upholds the law
and the principles of the Republic,

and that protects people's freedom.

That's what the law is all about.

When you embody an institution,
particularly at the highest levels,

that's the state of mind required.

And myself, as a citizen,

it's what I expect
from the people I elect.

What country do we live in

where a former head of state

can be subjected for months on end

to the surveillance
of his most personal conversations?

Attacks on the legal system
by certain politicians

discredit the Republic

and undermine public confidence
in the institution

and in democracy.

It's extremely serious.

It's even more serious
coming from a president

who is charged,
under the constitution,

with guaranteeing the independence
of the judiciary.

So he should be the last person
to make such remarks.

A few years ago,

the chief appellate judge

violently took a political stand

against me.

Violently and by name.

Do you consider it normal,
Mr. Toussaint,

for a judge who judges you
to be a political opponent?

On October 16, 2020,

after four days of hearings,

Nicolas Sarkozy was
indicted a second time

in the Libyan financing case,

on a charge that could deprive him

of his civil rights:
criminal conspiracy.

The new indictment gave rise to the
habitual attacks from his camp

against the legal system.

I hear he's in custody
for questioning

and think, "Again?"

I think the case will be dismissed.

Once again he'll be tarnished,

but when he's cleared

he'll get just one
line in the press.

It feels like a republic of judges,

and the judges
want to get Nicolas Sarkozy.

As I said yesterday,
the national financial crimes office

is not a prosecutor's office.

It's a political tool.

And we need to know
who it's working for.

And less than a month later,

the judicial conspiracy theory
suddenly found favor with the media

thanks to a spectacular
turn of events.

"Save Sarko"

We're going to show you a document.
Nicolas Sarkozy's main accuser

has changed his story.

This video was shot in Beirut

by Paris-Match and BFMTV.

Have a look.

Mr. Sarkozy did not
receive Libyan funds

for his presidential campaign,

and Mr. Gaddafi
couldn't have provided

them because he never did that.

I say that loud and clear.

The 32-second video,

filmed beside the marina in Beirut,

where Ziad Takieddine fled after

being sentenced to
five years in jail

in the Karachi affair,

was broadcast only on BFMTV,

accompanied by a long article
in the weekly Paris-Match.

Judge Tournaire

wanted to spin it to his own taste

and have me say things

totally contrary
to what I've always said.

There was no financing

of Mr. Sarkozy's
presidential campaign.

Ever.

There you have Takieddine's
clear statement...

Contradicting
all of his past statements,

Ziad Takieddine
exonerated Nicolas Sarkozy

and accused the legal system
of manipulating him.

The BFMTV scoop,

coming less than a month after
Sarkozy's second indictment,

gave him a miraculous opportunity

for a new media counter-offensive,

that started...on BFMTV.

If there was an investigation
of a former head of state

based only on
Mr. Takieddine's statements...

- Should there be one
of Judge Tournaire?

- That's not for me to decide.

But neither the media
nor the legal system can accept

that when Takieddine
denounces Sarkozy,

you have to investigate,

but when Takieddine
denounces a judge,

another judge can say,
24 hours later,

there's nothing to see, move along,
leave it alone.

No, Ma'am.

It wasn't enough for Ziad Takieddine
to retract his statement,

he also had to accuse
the magistrates.

It's a bit obvious,
but it went down well

with Les Républicains,

and his whole camp was galvanized
by the retraction.

Have magistrates

been blinded by a
desire for vengeance?

Or even a certain form of hatred?

When Mr.
Takieddine made an accusation

against a former head of state,

an investigation was
opened immediately.

When the same individual,
in the same case,

made an accusation
against a magistrate,

the response from

the financial
prosecutor's office is:

"Move along! Nothing to see here."

Of course, at Mediapart,

Karl Laske and I
were scratching our heads,

wondering what was
behind this event.

So we started checking.

What's going on with him in Beirut?

What is he living on?

We called all around
Beirut to find out

how his life was turning out,

what his friends and
family were saying.

We quickly discovered
that he was in dire straits.

He was ruined,

no home of his own,

with creditors
and lawyers harassing him,

demanding money.

His back was against the wall.

On that basis,

we took our curiosity
one step further

and tried to find out how
his retraction happened.

Who went to Beirut, and so on.

And indeed we learned

that a Paris-Match
journalist went to

Beirut, but that he wasn't alone.

In fact, behind
Ziad Takieddine's retraction

there was a whole cast
of colorful characters,

foremost among them a businesswoman

who's also known as

the big cheese of
the celebrity press:

Michèle Marchand,
nicknamed Mimi Marchand.

She has close ties
throughout French politics.

She's close with the Macrons,

but also with the Sarkozys,

Nicolas Sarkozy and
his wife Carla Bruni,

whom she'd known as
a singer and model

for several decades.

I'm just a free electron

who gets asked from time to time

"What do you think?"
But nothing else!

It's Mimi Marchand

who is suspected of heading up
a rather baroque venture

to convince Ziad Takieddine

to change his testimony
in the Libyan affair

in an attempt to
clear Nicolas Sarkozy.

One thing led to
another and we gathered

that money had been
put on the table,

that he was promised

the significant sum
of 4 million euros,

and we published two articles

that contributed to the opening
of a new investigation

into witness tampering in the case.

If this were a TV series,

and I love a good series,

I'd say the script is implausible.

Unfortunately,
it doesn't make me laugh,

because it's serious.

Not just for me,

not just for my family,

not just for those
who believed in me,

but for France,

which is giving the impression

that it's former head of state
could be corrupt.

It's ignominious.

Professor of economics
at Sciences Po Paris

Author of Save the Media

To organize Takieddine's retraction,

you have to organize
all the media coverage around it.

I won't go into the details,

but it's not just:
"Let's put it on the front page."

You make it a saga.

You get the right guests,
the right forums.

A lot of work goes into it.

Behind all that was Mimi Marchand,

a high-powered press attaché

who does her job very well,
from that point of view.

Good evening, Hervé Gattegno.

You're the managing editor
of Paris-Match,

which published Ziad Takieddine's
change of position...

Asked about the background
of the retraction,

the managing editor of Paris-Match
was not very forthcoming.

Was he the one who contacted you

because he wanted
to make the new statement?

Or did you seek him out

and convince him to talk to you?

Neither one, as is often the case.

I won't tell you all the secrets
of the "making-of" the interview.

If I did, it would burst
the professional bubble,

and sources need to be respected.

But it was neither.

We met him, he talked.
As you know, Ziad Takieddine

doesn't need much encouragement.

It's clear in this Libyan affair

that the main investigator
was Mediapart.

Beyond them, unless I'm mistaken,

there was no cover of Le Point,

or L'Express,

or the Nouvel Observateur.

It did not lead to massive coverage.

The question is why?

There are two possible factors,

probably both at work.

First, in the
competitive media market,

a new actor, Mediapart,

had done very well
in a short period of time,

making some of the
competition jealous.

So some of those competitors

maybe didn't want
to "help them out",

and didn't cover it much
since it wasn't their scoop.

That's a first element.

And it's doesn't
contradict the second.

Which is that, in the media sector,

there's a very influential actor,
the Groupe Lagardère,

and one member of its
board of directors

was Nicolas Sarkozy.

When you have a former president
sitting on a board

of a group that owns media outlets,

and a shareholder of those media

knows how to intervene
and does so regularly,

it's not surprising
that the story wasn't

making headlines in
JDD or Paris-Match.

Except

to announce the retraction
of a certain witness.

The legal investigation obviously
went much further than we could,

and was able to bring together

the exchanges of all
of the protagonists,

which clearly proved

that the four million were promised
in writing to Takieddine,

and that Takieddine
talked for that reason.

By investigating Michèle Marchand,

we learned she was in contact
with Carla Bruni,

Nicolas Sarkozy's wife,

and that the three discussed
the subject.

Nicolas Sarkozy was informed
before it was published,

before the operation went online.

That makes him a
potential accomplice,

if not the manager
of the whole operation.

The "Save Sarko" operation

was investigated by
the Paris courts,

separately from
the Libyan financing investigation.

The entente that had prevailed among
the main protagonists of the staging

turned to fisticuffs.

Hervé Gattegno,

who denies committing
any criminal offense,

was not a subject of
the investigation.

Wiretap of Michèle Marchand

"The deus ex machina
was Hervé Gattegno.

"He planned it, not me.

"I just carried it out."

Wiretap between
Arnaud Lagardère and Hervé Gattegno

Gattegno:

"In one fell swoop
we gave it to him,

"how could he resist?

"And you know Sarko,
he wants to meddle

in everything, he wants to run it."

Nicolas Sarkozy Hearing
October 10, 2023

"You could say (Michèle Marchand)
tricked me.

"If I'd known what she was up to,

my attitude would
have been different."

Michèle Marchand Hearing
November 10, 2023

"It's not right to say that.

"It's not right or gracious.

"But it doesn't matter.

"We know what
the person who said it is like."

The Ziad Takieddine
retraction affair

became the false retraction affair,

and it led to the indictment

of Michèle Marchand
and her presumed accomplices,

and also of Nicolas Sarkozy,

who was indicted for
criminal conspiracy

to commit a very specific fraud,

which is called a "judgement fraud".

It's an attempt
to manipulate the legal system

in order to be exonerated

when you're implicated in a crime.

The investigation

also shed light on the close ties
between Nicolas Sarkozy's team,

the management of BFMTV,
and certain journalists

who promoted Ziad Takieddine's
false retraction.

Text exchange, November 11, 2020

Sarkozy's communications
officer and BFMTV

Waché: N.S. could go on with Ruth.

It hits hard.
N.S.'s reaction on Facebook.

Fogiel: Great! You'll let me know?

Waché: Yes, we're on it.

What broadcast slot
looks best to you?

Fogiel: If he talks to Ruth,
we'll do several.

So the first broadcast
doesn't matter much,

but it could be 7pm [...]

What would your schedule be?

Text exchange, November 13, 2020

Sarkozy's communications
officer and BFMTV

Elkrief:
Are you getting good feedback?

Waché: Excellent!!!
Thank you, dear Ruth!

Decisive broadcast for us.

Elkrief: I hope so,
from the bottom of my heart.

Text exchange November 14, 2020

Sarkozy's communications
officer and BFMTV

Fogiel: Good feedback?

Waché: Fabulous!

Fogiel: Great!

Waché: Actually, anytime

you have to deal with
the Libyan affair,

you can quote from it.

The links between Nicolas Sarkozy
and Arnaud Lagardère

are far from secret

because they're not discreet at all.

That's what's interesting.
It could be a situation

with a politician

pulling the strings
in the background,

trying to influence things,

but doing it discreetly.

But he didn't even see the problem.

When Lagardère asked Nicolas Sarkozy

to sit on his board,

nobody saw a problem.

It's a big problem.

You know exactly what you're doing.

And Nicolas Sarkozy knew very well
why he accepted.

There are strong
links - too strong -

between the political sphere

and the media sphere.

They need to be questioned

about the conditions they create

in terms of corruption, favors,

and unpublished information.

And we also need to ask ourselves

why we're not more
shocked than we are.

Collectively.

July 11, 2024

For the station manager:

"Move along. Nothing to see here."

"As always, the station

"worked with complete independence

and was journalistically
irreproachable."

What's interesting in the case of
Ziad Takieddine's false retraction

is that Nicolas Sarkozy,
as in the Libyan affair,

dropped his former partners.

As he did in the Bismuth case,
in which he was convicted

and dropped his lawyer,
Thierry Herzog;

as in the Bygmalion case,
in which he was convicted

and dropped his campaign team;

as in the Libyan financing affair

in which he dropped Brice Hortefeux
and Claude Guéant,

so he dropped Mimi Marchand,
who was a family friend,

in particular of his
wife Carla Bruni.

So from case to case,

we find ourselves
with a head of state

who sometimes seems to
behave like a godfather.

Like the godfather
of a political mafia who,

as the judicial flames
close in on him,

is prepared
to cut every tie that binds him

to his lieutenants,
to those who've been implicated.

I told the judges:

"Search for a century if you want,

"you won't find anything."

They looked everywhere.

And why won't they find anything?

Because there's nothing to find.

For 14 years,

Nicolas Sarkozy and his cabinet
categorically refused

to answer questions from
Mediapart about the affair.

Questioned by the magistrates,

Nicolas Sarkozy
justified that refusal:

"I never respond to Mediapart
because they're not journalists.

"They're political hacks,

"waging a political war."

We've been sued

by Nicolas Sarkozy, Brice Hortefeux,

Claude Guéant, Ziad Takieddine,

and by journalists
close to Nicolas Sarkozy.

We won resoundingly in every case.

We were never convicted of forgery,
use of forgeries, defamation,

or infringement on
the presumption of innocence.

We'll see if the facts we uncovered,

and those uncovered by the police
and investigating magistrates,

will meet a definition
in the penal code

that will authorize a court
to convict - or not -

Nicolas Sarkozy, Brice Hortefeux,
Claude Guéant,

Alexandre Djouhri, Ziad Takieddine,
Eric Woerth, and the others.

There are currently 13 defendants

in the Sarkozy-Gaddafi proceedings.

Whatever the outcome,

Mediapart will not change
a single comma

from the articles it devoted
to this story

because we have only done our job,

which is to publish verified facts

that are of public interest.

The case known as
the presumed Libyan financing affair

went to trail
on January 6, 2025.

Messrs. Alexandre Djouhri,
Thierry Gaubert,

Claude Guéant, Brice Hortefeux,

Bashir Saleh, Nicolas Sarkozy,
Ziad Takieddine, and Eric Woerth,

along with five others,
have been referred

to the Paris Court of Justice

to stand trial.
They are presumed innocent.

The chances of factual truth
surviving the onslaught of power

are very slim indeed;

it is always in danger
of being maneuvered out of the world

not only for a time but,
potentially, forever.

Subtitles: Jennifer Gay