Nicolas Sarkozy Receive Money From Gaddafi To fund His Election Bid

Nicolas Sarkozy's links with Muammar Gaddafi have come under fresh scrutiny after a businessman admitted delivering three cash-stuffed suitcases from the late Libyan leader towards the Frenchman's first presidential bid.

In an interview with the Mediapart investigative news site, Franco-Lebanese businessman Ziad Takieddine has said he made three trips from Tripoli to Paris in late 2006 and early 2007 with cash for Sarkozy's campaign.

Each time he carried a suitcase containing between 1.5 and 2m euros in 200-euro and 500-euro notes, Takieddine told the site in a video interview, saying he was given the money by Abdallah Senussi, Gaddafi's military intelligence chief.

Sarkozy, 61, seeking to return to power as French president, denied on Tuesday receiving money from Gaddafi to fund his election bid, calling claims by Takieddine a "crude manipulation".

During questioning in a separate case, Takieddine accused Sarkozy of having been in Gaddafi's pocket in 2006-07 but he had never previously claimed to be the bagman.

The allegations against Sarkozy first emerged in March 2011, when the French leader was campaigning for the NATO-led military intervention that helped overthrow Gaddafi.

"Sarkozy must first give back the money he took from Libya to finance his electoral campaign," said Gaddafi's son Saif al-Islam, who is now in jail in Libya.