Gaddafi regime 'agreed to fund Sarkozy 2007 campaign'

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Muammar Gaddafi's regime agreed to fund French President Nicolas Sarkozy's 2007 election campaign to the tune of 50 million euros, a news website reported Saturday, publishing what it said was documentary evidence.

The 2006 document in Arabic, which website Mediapart said was signed by Gaddafi's intelligence chief Mussa Kussa, referred to an "agreement in principle to support the campaign for the candidate for the presidential elections, Nicolas Sarkozy, for a sum equivalent to 50 million euros."

The left-wing investigative website made similar assertions on March 12, based on testimony by a former doctor of a French arms dealer alleged to have arranged the campaign donation, which Sarkozy slammed as "grotesque."

"If he had financed it, I wasn't very grateful," Sarkozy said sarcastically, in an apparent reference to the active role that France played in the NATO campaign that led to the strongman's ouster.

The latest report comes as Sarkozy trails Socialist rival Francois Hollande in opinion polls ahead of the run-off second round of presidential elections on May 6.