Nearly two years after leaving office, Nicolas Sarkozy is back in the headlines due to two separate court hearings this week. The former president, who lost to François Hollande in 2012, faces potentially damaging corruption allegations and embarrassing private conversations being made public.
On Monday, Sarkozy and his wife Carla Bruni-Sarkozy will seek an injunction against the further publication of recordings of their private conversations made by former Elysée aide Patrick Buisson. The couple argue the leaks breach their privacy, though Buisson's lawyer claims they knew they were being recorded and that the tapes were stolen and leaked to Le Canard Enchainé.
On Tuesday, France's highest appeal court will rule on whether Sarkozy's diaries were seized illegally in police raids as part of the 'Bettencourt Affair' investigation into alleged illegal donations from L'Oréal heiress Liliane Bettencourt. Charges were dropped last autumn, but a new investigation was opened on Friday into accusations that Sarkozy and his lawyer obtained secret legal information about the appeal case from a prosecutor allegedly rewarded with a sinecure in Monaco.
Both Sarkozy and his lawyer Thierry Herzog deny the new allegations, which emerged after investigators bugged the former president and his lawyer while looking into claims of illegal donations from former Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi. The bugging has sparked fury among the French legal profession over breaches of client confidentiality.
Despite his pledge to stay out of politics after losing the 2012 election, Sarkozy has maintained a presence through 'postcards' to the French people. However, this week's hearings promise to keep him in the spotlight for all the wrong reasons.
