Over several years, beginning in 2005, Franco-Lebanese businessman and arms dealer Ziad Takieddine acted as the pivotal intermediary on behalf of Nicolas Sarkozy’s closest aides in negotiations for lucrative military and security contracts with the regime of Libyan dictator Colonel Muammar Gaddafi. Takieddine’s role began when Sarkozy served as French interior minister and continued after the latter was elected president of France in 2007.
According to confidential documents obtained by Mediapart, Takieddine worked on the Libyan contracts in close collaboration with then-interior minister Sarkozy’s principal private secretary, Claude Guéant, who himself is now French Minister of the Interior.
Mediapart’s investigation here, based on exclusive documents published for the first time, raises a number of significant questions, including the nature of the deals and negotiations with the Libyans, and the role of the French interior ministry in weapons sales. Beyond this, it also highlights a surprisingly cordial relationship with the Gaddafi regime – against which France and its NATO partners are now engaged in a military campaign for its overturn - and several of its most infamous members.
Contacted by Mediapart, the French presidential office said it did not wish to comment on the subjects raised in this report.
Takieddine, 61, is cited in ongoing investigations led by Paris-based examining magistrates Renaud Van Ruymbeke and Roger Le Loire into suspected illegal political financing in France from the sale of three French Agosta class submarines to Pakistan in the 1990s. The magistrates enquiry was launched after suspicions that the significant sums officially destined as commissions - or bribes - to Pakistani officials ended up returning, illegally, to France to fund political activities. Suspicion centres on former prime minister Edouard Balladur's political movement and unsuccessful 1995 presidential election campaign, for which his budget minister, Nicolas Sarkozy, also served as official campaign spokesman.
Several witnesses questioned by the magistrates have designated Takieddine as a key intermediary in the 1994 contract who was imposed on the deal by Balladur’s government shortly before it was concluded. Balladur, Sarkozy and Takieddine have firmly denied knowledge of illegal political funding via the commissions.
The suspicions of illegal political funding are key to what has become known as ‘the Karachi affair', a potentially far-reaching political scandal that owes its name to the murders, in 2002, of 11 French naval engineers who were helping build one of the three Agosta submarines in the Pakistani port city. (See Mediapart's Q&A guide here and a video presentation here).
Throughout July, Mediapart has run a series of investigative reports about the activities and relations of France-based Takieddine. Written and photographic documents exclusively obtained by Mediapart and published in the five preceding reports have demonstrated the very close and longstanding links, both professional and social, between Takieddine and Nicolas Sarkozy’s immediate entourage. Mediapart has revealed how Takieddine surprisingly pays no income nor wealth tax in France, his fiscal domicile and where, according to documents signed by him, his personal fortune has an estimated value of more than 40 million euros.
Mediapart has further disclosed how in 2003 Takieddine was destined to receive 350 million euros in secret commissions from another arms contract , this time with Saudi Arabia, negotiated on behalf of Nicolas Sarkozy’s aides via a company run by the French interior ministry when it was headed by Sarkozy. Mediapart has also disclosed how the arms dealer, while negotiating that contract, was saved by Sarkozy's entourage after an alleged assassination attempt on the exlusive Caribbean island of Mustique.
In the negotiations with Libya between 2005 and 2007, the collusion between Claude Guéant, a minister’s principal private secretary, and an arms dealing intermediary was, at the very least, unusual. Information contained in documents obtained by Mediapart suggests that Takieddine had allowed for Guéant’s “total control” over future contracts signed with Libya.
The relationship between Guéant and Takieddine began in 2003 with the negotiations to supply Saudi Arabia with a border surveillance system. Called the Saudi Border Guard Defence Program, and codenamed Miksa, the project involved securing Saudi Arabia’s 9,000 kilometres of borders, including the supply of helicopters, aircraft, radars and a collection of highly-sophisticated communications systems. The contract was led by the French interior ministry, then headed by Sarkozy, and managed through its services and consultancy company CIVIPOL.
It was for this deal that Takieddine was to receive a commission of 350 million euros for his services as an intermediary. However, the deal was blocked at the last minute, in early1994, by then-President Jacques Chirac. A former high-ranking figure in the French arms industry, whose identity is deliberately withheld, has told Mediapart that Chirac suspected that the deal included a scheme to provide funding for Sarkozy's political camp which was already eyeing the next presidential election campaign in 2007.
In 2005, Takieddine became involved in new activities as an intermediary under the control of the interior ministry, this time with Libya. Sarkozy first served as interior minister between May 2002 and March 2004, when he became finance and economy minister. He was re-appointed interior minister in June 2005.
Between September and December 2005, Takieddine organized visits to the Libyan capital Tripoli by Sarkozy, freshly re-appointed interior minister, Claude Guéant and also a junior minister with responsibility for French regional authorities and a close political ally of Sarkozy’s, Brice Hortefeux. The latter is now an advisor to the French president.
Following Nicolas Sarkozy’s victory in the presidential elections of 2007, Takieddine played a key role in the French presidency's negotiations to free five Bulgarian nurses and a Palestinian doctor imprisoned for life in Libya for allegedly conspiring to infect children with the HIV virus. This ultimately successful bid, in which the French president’s wife Cécilia, from whom he is now divorced, played a high-profile part, marked the Sarkozy administration's first major diplomatic coup. Both Takieddine and Guéant have previously confirmed the former’s role in the liberation in interviews with Mediapart journalists conducted more than a year ago.
The documents obtained by Mediapart, including Takieddine’s personal notes and others from the interior ministry and the presidential offices, show that secret commercial negotiations were conducted in the background to such events. However, Guéant has denied this, and notably under oath when testifying in December 2007 before a French parliamentary commission of enquiry into the circumstances of the deal to free the Bulgarian nurses.
On June 22nd 2005, just weeks after Sarkozy’s return to the post of interior minister, his Libyan counterpart wrote to congratulate him. In his letter to Sarkozy, Libyan Minister for Public Security, Nasr al-Mabrouk Abdullah, whose official title was Secretary of the Popular Committees and National Security, expressed his “wish to establish a serious cooperation in all the fields of security” and his “will to meet you as quickly as possible, in Paris or Tripoli”.
Following this, Takieddine got quickly underway with preparing the contacts, as testified by several documents, handwritten in Arabic and sent to the Libyan authorities with the heading “very confidential-private” . Most of these were addressed to the Libyan regime’s security chief Abdullah Senussi, who is also Gaddafi’s brother-in-law. In 1999, Senussi was sentenced in absentia to life imprisonment by a French court for his part in the 1989 bombing of a French DC10 passenger plane over Niger, in which 170 people lost their lives. An international arrest warrant was later issued against Senussi (click here for Mediapart’s earlier investigation into the links between Senussi, Ziad Takieddine and Claude Guéant).
Guéant's visit 'must be of a secret nature'
Takieddine prepared a list of acquisitions the Libyans were interested in making. The first concerned the sale to them of a system for making biometric passports and identity cards. In one of his personal notes, Takieddine mentions "the agreement given by minister Sarkozy for the fulfillment of this project". He also referred to a plan for an invitation for a stay in Libya by "officials from the French company Sagem" which would manage the project "under the supervision of the French Ministry of the Interior".
Takieddine also noted that another priority for the Libyans was "the modernisation of military aviation, of Mirage F1s", adding: "We would like to fix an appointment with the official responsible for military purchases, General Abdul-Rahman al-Sid."
He catalogued other potential deals: "Among the important subjects that will be discussed, the project for the protection of ports and frontiers, it is desirable to prepare the discussions." Takieddine explained that "the French company Sagem is in this domain a world leader" and that it was "very urgent" to address an "official invitation from the very highest officials in charge of security to the chairman of the company, Monsieur Jacques Paccard and the director of operations, Monsieur Jean-Paul Jainsky, to determine the grand lines of this project". Paccard, Jainsky and another Sagem director were invited to Libya at the end of September, 2005 (see 'Scribd' box below).
Arrangements for Sagem delegation trip to Libya, September 2005.
The "modernisation and renovation of Sukhoi and Mirage planes" of the Libyan air force was also eyed by Takieddine. "We hope that you will discuss with the Sagem chairman the question of the rehabilitation of these planes [...] You need to know that this company has taken charge of the modernization of planes offered to Pakistan by Libya" he wrote. He suggested organizing the invitation to Libya of Eurocopter CEO and Chairman Fabrice Brégier, along with his Executive Vice President, Philippe Harache, in order to pursue the discussions and to establish the characteristics of 15 Eurocopter Tiger attack helicopters the Libyans were interested in acquiring.
With the ground prepared, the French interior minister's staff, headed by Claude Guéant, began negotiations in earnest with the Libyans at the end of the summer, 2005. Ziad Takieddine became the key intermediary, and one who ignored all the rules. The exchanges between he and Claude Guéant were formal, as testified by an official interior ministry document (see 'Scribd' box below), transmitted by Guéant's personal secretariat, (secrétariat particulier, or SP).
On September 6th 2005, Takieddine sent a "confidential" note to Claude Guéant headed "Visit of the Minister, October 6th 2005" (see 'Scribd' box further below). Apart from political matters to be discussed with the Libyans, on the subjects of terrorism, immigration and the situation in North Africa, progressing with the contracts - systems for border protection, identity cards and passports - was a high priority.
Takieddine urged that Nicolas Sarkozy's visit should be preceded by a "preparatory visit by the principal private secretary", one which was "of extreme importance". He explained the object of this visit as being the "formulation of the message and theme of the major visit". He left little doubt over the true nature of the project: "The ‘contents', thus set out, will take into account the sensitivities of the country, thus creating a ‘partnership' which will allow for the realization of the commercial objective."
The sensitive nature of the project was clear: "The preparatory visit is unusual. It must be of a secret nature", wrote Takieddine, repeating almost word for word the same message that he used in one of his reports during preparations for the ‘Miksa' contract in Saudi Arabia (see page 1).
"For this reason it will be preferable that CG [Claude Guéant] travels alone, and that the journey is done ‘without fanfare'". Takieddine then continued with a curious comment: "The other advantage: greater ease with which to broach the other important subject, in the most straightforward manner." The "other important subject" was not explained in the document. He ends with advice, also as given during the Miksa contract, that raises more questions: "It is essential that the ‘business' side of the visit is not placed at the fore by the official preparations. Only as an important point within the framework of ‘exchanges' between the two countries in the area of the fight against terrorism."
Ziad Takieddines notes for 'Visit of the Minister, October 6th 2005'.
Things moved swiftly. On September 10th, interior minister Sarkozy wrote to Gaddafi's public security minister Nasr al-Mabrouk Abdullah (see 'Scribd' box below), confirming his keenness to visit Libya. Upon Takieddine's advice, he wrote: "Monsieur Claude Guéant, my principal private secretary, could travel to Tripoli before the end of September in order to prepare the talks that we will have."
Nicolas Sarkozy's letter to Libya's public security minister, Nasr al-Mabrouk Abdullah, September 10th 2005.
On September 22nd 2005, Takieddine sent another note on the preparatory visit to Guéant, referring to the arms contracts on the agenda. Takieddine notably mentioned the "protection of borders carried out by the French security pole led by Sagem and the ‘refit' of the Mirages, Sukhois (170 in all)". Armaments deals of the sort would in theory normally be managed by the French defence ministry rather than the Ministry of the Interior.
Chirac's camp moves to block deal
Takieddine's note of September 22nd 2005 (see 'Scribd' box below) also referred to "the implication and surveillance of the work connected to the security contracts and the will of the ministry to supervise by the ministry (CIVIPOL), in order to guarantee the proper implementation both of the work and the contract [sic]". CIVIPOL is a services and consultancy company belonging to the French interior ministry.
Ziad Takieddine's note dated September 22nd 2005.
The following day, Guéant wrote to the Libyan public security minister (see 'Scribd' box below), confirming his arrival in Tripoli "during the evening of the September 30th and returning the Sunday, October 2nd".
Claude Guéant's letter to Libyan security minister dated September 23rd 2005.
In November 2005, it was the turn of Brice Hortefeux, interior ministry junior minister with responsibility for French regional authorities, and a longstanding ally of Nicolas Sarkozy's, to become involved in the written exchanges with Libya. In a letter addressed to Libyan public security minister Nasr al-Mabrouk Abdullah (see 'Scribd' box below) he expressed his thanks for being invited to Libya, for which he employs an abbreviation of the Gaddafi regime's official title of ‘Great Socialist People's Libyan Arab Jamahiriya' (1). He wrote of how his visit would be an occasion to bring up "different questions of common interest and to favour relations between the Great Jamahiriya and France in the framework of interior security and decentralized cooperation [projects]".
Brice Hortefeux' letter to Libyan security minister, November 2005.
However, the political infighting between the Sarkozy and Chirac camps of the ruling right in France became sensitive to the Libyan negotiations, just as previously over the interior minister's attempts, scuppered by Chirac, to conclude a deal with Saudi Arabia between 2003 and 2004.
Shortly after Nicolas Sarkozy's first visit to Libya, Ziad Takieddine wrote to Gaddafi's security chief Abdullah Senussi informing him that the French interior minister had "briefed" both the French Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin and President Jacques Chirac of the "results" of his visit and especially the agreements or conventions due to be signed shortly after.
Takieddine assured Senussi that "Sagem is the company to which the minister [Sarkozy] has the intention of entrusting with the entire border surveillance contract."
Among Takieddine's documents, consulted by Mediapart, there is a note, either preparatory or as a summary, concerning a meeting he held in January 2006 with then-Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin's economic intelligence advisor, Alain Juillet. Takieddine wrote:
"Concerning your analyses about the ‘return of the Lebanese', I would like to tell you that I adhere to this entirely [...] There are all kinds of Lebanese, as you very well know, I do not carry out the same functions as Tamraz or Traboulsi [Editor's note: also Lebanese acting as contract intermediaries]: I have a role as advisor, of ‘evangelizing' the client, which goes well beyond the inevitable distribution of commissions on large international contracts. Tamraz, fired, because has no added value other than the necessary bother over the distribution of the said commissions."
In May 2006, several consultancy contracts were prepared between Sagem's defence branch, Sagem Défense Sécurité, and Takieddine's offshore-based companies Como Holding, Tristar Holding and Al Charara.
However, President Chirac's camp eventually succeeded in ousting Sagem from the Libyan contract. The renovation of Libya's fleet of Mirage fighter jets was handed to aviation group Dassault, manufacturers of the plane. In the process, members of the Sagem board were also removed from their jobs. The events are detailed in a book, Armes de corruption massive (Weapons of mass corruption), published this year by journalist Jean Guisnel, a specialist in military and intelligence issues for French weekly news magazine Le Point.
But for all this, Takieddine, pursuing his activities with the Sarkozy team, was not giving up. In April 2006, he introduced to the Libyan market a French group specialized in electronic warfare. Based in Aix-en-Provence, in southern France, the company, called i2e, was run by Philippe Vannier, who was last year appointed as the Chairman and CEO of IT company Bull.
"Monsieur Vannier has understood that the country has a radar system made by Electronica," Takieddine wrote in a private note dated February 2006. "The communications transiting by these systems are not sufficiently protected, [and are] even listened in on or jammed." He devised a proposition "to render secure these installations" and "to put in place an encrypted transmitter-receiver system". An encryption system sold by the company i2e, called Cryptowall, based on its own algorithms, was, Takieddine noted, "difficult to break".
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1: Jamahiriya: roughly translated from Arabic as 'state of the masses'.
A shopping list of deals
The documents prepared by i2e boast of the firm's ability to counter-act the covert US-led Echelon global surveillance and communications interception system, an eavesdroping network jointly managed with the UK, Canada, Australia and New Zealand.
"Echelon is a very confidential worldwide eavesdropping and analysis network operated by the UK-USA community. Echelon intercepts radio and communications signals from satellites, telephones, fax machines, emails almost anywhere in the world," began the company's presentation for the Libyan buyers (see 'Scribd' box below).
Further below in the presentation it indicates that "The tapping of mobile phones by Echelon allowed the localization and then the arrest in March 2003 of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed," referring to the capture in 2003 in Pakistan of the man regarded by the US as one of al-Qaeda's senior leaders.
"Our procedures are totally unique and offer an inviolable solution to the Anglo-American espionage system [...] Libya's vital interests will not be spared by the Echelon system," the document continues, before openly claiming a link to then-interior minister Nicolas Sarkozy. "The French Minister of the Interior disposes of genuine knowledge corroborated by collaboration with the company specialised in this domain. It therefore behoves us to assist you in carrying out an in-depth investigation on the nature of the information at risk of being obtained by Echelon."
i2e presentation of Cryptowall
A first contract, worth 33 million euros, was aimed at equipping the operational headquarters of the Libyan navy. On April 10th 2007, i2e signed, in parallel, contracts for consulting work with two of Takieddine's offshore companies, Como Holding and Tristar Holding.
According to documents obtained by Mediapart, i2e paid the arms dealer between December 2007 and October 2008 commissions of 2.4 million euros to Como Holding and 2.07 million euros to Tristar (see 'Scribd' box below). The payment of such commissions is illegal in France since 2000.
i2e payments to Ziad Takieddine
Under another security contract signed by i2e with the Libyan authorities designed to provide security for VIP travel, Takieddine's Tristar Holding was promised another commission totalling 30% of a 7 million-euro contract.
Nicolas Sarkozy's election as President of France in May, 2007 opened up a new, promising, chapter for Takieddine, according to a confidential note written by him and dated June 11th 2007:
"Colonel Gaddafi wishes to see a new page opened in relations with the new President of the French Republic [...] Industrial and technical cooperation assorted with job creation must be put in place. This policy must lead to the implementation of a new system placing contracts that should follow through, under the auspices of the new president."
Takieddine then suggests creating a "new company placed under the control of the government [...] so as to develop exports of French equipment to Libya [...], for the promotion of defence and security equipment and systems and for the negotiation of the corresponding contracts".
"The Libyans are concerned to profit their economy from economic benefits through technology transfer," Takieddine continued. He gave several examples:
"- a nuclear power plant
- Airbus A330 which has already been chosen, but suspended while waiting for the arrival of the new French President, and the implementation of his new policies, thus incarnating his break with past policies.
- Returning Mirage F1s to the air
- Rafale fighter planes."
Another confidential note dated the same day, June 11th 2007, refers to a planned visit to Tripoli by Brice Hortefeux, then recently appointed as Minister for Immigration and National Identity. It was also the first mention in Takieddine's notes of the attempts to free five Bulgarian nurses from imprisonment in Libya, and which was directly linked to commercial contracts.
"The Minister, Monsieur Brice Hortefeux, is scheduled to go to Tripoli soon. He could prepare the official [sales] orders for France.
The subjects:
- The Bulgarian nurses: The Minister is responsible for the negotiation of the agreement in view of a resolving of this affair by France. The Minister will discuss with the authorities responsible for this case [...].
- Cooperation and accords between the two countries in the fields of security (borders, identity cards, passports and others), immigration. Signature of accords wished by France, following on the last visit of the minister to Libya."
As events unfolded, Hortefeux was to relinquish his primary role in favour of Guéant.
Nurses and contracts
After Nicolas Sarkozy's election in May 2007, Claude Guéant was appointed as chief-of-staff (secretary-general) of the presidential office, the Elysée. It was as such that he was auditioned on December 13th 2007 by a French parliamentary commission of enquiry into the circumstances of the freeing of the Bulgarian nurses and a Palestinian doctor in July that year. Guéant told the commission that the proposal to release the nurses came from Moussa Koussa, then-head of Libyan intelligence. It was later discussed during two telephone conversations between Nicolas Sarkozy and Muammar Gaddafi on May 28th and June 29th, 2007, he added.
He also stated that there was no deal agreed in return for the release of the nurses, obtained on July 24th 2007 during Guéant's second trip to Tripoli in company of Cécilia Sarkozy, which followed a first trip on July 12th.
Speaking under oath, Guéant said that the release was prompted by humanitarian concerns as well as for reasons of image and of a political order. "There was no trade-off," he told the commission, "I have already said so and I am repeating it, France did not pay out one cent. France did not conclude the least contract during the talks on the release of the nurses and of the doctor. France did not exchange their freedom against opportunities for further cooperation."
The announcement that a Franco-Libyan framework cooperation agreement as well as seven bi-lateral accords were signed during Nicolas Sarkozy's visit to Tripoli following the release of the nurses had indeed raised suspicions of a deal. One whereby France offered Libya political reinstatement and Tripoli the contracts.
According to Ziad Takieddine's notes, Claude Guéant managed the project to free the Bulgarian nurses in concert with Abdullah Senussi, Gaddafi's brother-in-law and security chief. However, Guéant did not mention this during his testimony to the parliamentary commission in December 2007.
A US law firm, Patton Boggs, was even tasked by the Libyans to handle the legal aspects. The Prime Minister of Qatar, Hamad bin Jassem, acted as an intermediary between the European Union, France and Libya. Reports of an advance by Qatar of the amount of the compensation paid to the families of the children the Libyan authorities claimed the medics had infected with AIDS was never confirmed. The report of the French parliamentary commission of enquiry concluded that the extent of Qatar's "intervention" was "for now unknown".
The notes 'On the Patton Boggs dossier'.
The management of the operation closely links then-secretary-general of the presidency Guéant, and arms dealer Takieddine. Guéant sent Takieddine, from the office of the presidency, two documents for his validation (see 'Scribd' box below).
In a letter addressed to the Libyan authorities on July 20th 2007, Guéant outlined future partnerships between the European Union and Libya. He set out France's intentions "to reinforce its bi-lateral cooperation in the fields of technological development, of civil nuclear power, of defence and of training".
In another letter to Takieddine, dated August 29th 2007, Guéant sent Gaddafi's son Saif al-Islam Gaddafi a proposed declaration by the Colonel on the question of trade-offs for the release of the nurses. He was returned a corrected version (see 'Scribd' box below):
"I wish first to contest in the most firm and most solemn manner the existence of any French ‘trade-off'. It was a humanitarian affair for the contaminated children of Benghazi and their families [...] By coming to me on a State visit on July 25th, the President of the French Republic wanted to send the signal that new relations of confidence exist between the Great Jamahiriya, France and Europe. On a bi-lateral level, this visit is the result of a continuous process, begun several years ago, of tightening of our relations, [...] Such an approach rests on a ‘win-win' approach which has nothing to do with the existence of supposed trade-offs. That French and European businesses should obtain contracts in the framework of the political, economic or social development of the Great Jamahiriya, what could be more natural?"
The correspondence between Claude Guéant and Ziad Takieddine.
On September 3rd 2007, Takieddine wrote in his notes that "relations with President NS are excellent and auspicious for relations between the two countries. The Leader expects much of his visit for which a date should be rapidly set."
Takieddine continued hoping to obtain the creation of State companies that would manage the flow of Franco-Libyan trade: "Focus on its creation and who will head it so that it can be under the total control of CG," he wrote. "As concerns Libya, it has chosen Mohammed Ismail, designated by the Leader personally. He is the closest advisor (chief-of-staff to Saif al-Islam). Why such a choice? It corresponds to a will to choose, as France has, a man of confidence and an intimate, to be able to give this company the role [for which] it is intended."
On March 5th this year, customs officials arrested Ziad Takieddine after he landed in a private aircraft at Le Bourget airport, near Paris, returning from Libya. He was carrying 1.5 million euros. After he was briefly held for questioning, a preliminary investigation was opened into "suspected money laundering" and "failure to abide by required declarations". Takieddine told the customs officers that the money onboard the plane was from "a transfer between commercial companies". The result of the customs investigation remains unknown.
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For further understanding of the background to events reported above, a useful timeline to key moments in Libyan history - and notably events since Colonel Gaddafi's arrival in power during a military coup in 1969 - can be found on the BBC News website by clicking here.
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English version by Patricia Brett and Graham Tearse
(Editing by Graham Tearse)