Ex-president Sarkozy stripped of France's top honor after conviction
PARIS (AFP) — Former French President Nicolas Sarkozy has been stripped of his Legion of Honor — the country's highest distinction — following a conviction for graft, according to a decree published Sunday.
The right-winger has been beset by legal problems since he was defeated in the 2012 presidential election after serving one five-year term.
Sarkozy, 70, had been wearing an electronic ankle tag until last month after France's highest appeals court upheld his conviction last December of trying to illegally secure favors from a judge.
According to the code of the Legion of Honor, France's top state award, any person definitively sentenced to a term in prison equal to or greater than one year is excluded from the order.
But French President Emmanuel Macron had argued against such a move in April, saying that scandal-plagued Sarkozy had been elected and it was "very important that former presidents are respected."
Despite his legal problems, Sarkozy remains an influential figure on the right and is known to regularly socialize with the president.
Sarkozy becomes the second former head of state to be stripped of the award after Nazi collaborator Philippe Petain, who was convicted in August 1945 for high treason and conspiring with the enemy.
Others to have been stripped of the honor include former Syrian president Bashar Assad, drug cheat cyclist Lance Armstrong and movie mogul Harvey Weinstein whose conduct with women sparked the #MeToo movement against sexual violence.
Sarkozy is using his last remaining legal avenue, an appeal to the European Court of Human Rights, to defend himself against the conviction.
Shameful comparison
Sarkozy's lawyer Patrice Spinosi said the former president had "taken note" of the decision to strip him of the Legion of Honor, but stressed that the petition lodged with the ECHR was "still pending."
Any ECHR ruling against France would "imply reviewing the criminal conviction against (Sarkozy) as well as his exclusion from the order of the Legion of Honor," Spinosi said.
French Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot stressed that the "case has not been completely closed" in view of the appeal at European level.
Government spokeswoman Sophie Primas added that comparisons between Sarkozy and Petain were "shameful."
Sarkozy is currently on trial in a separate case on charges of accepting illegal campaign financing in an alleged pact with late Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi.
The court is to issue a verdict in September with prosecutors asking for a seven-year prison term for Sarkozy, who denies the charges.
The Grand Chancellor of the Legion of Honor, General Francois Lecointre, has stressed the importance of disciplinary measures to uphold the order's integrity.
Lecointre told reporters in March that "the honor of the order depends on the fact that those decorated can also be sanctioned."
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