PARIS, France (AFP) — Former French president Nicolas Sarkozy on Tuesday entered a Paris jail where he will be incarcerated over seeking to acquire Libyan funding for his 2007 presidential run.

“Welcome Sarkozy!” “Sarkozy’s here,” AFP reporters heard convicts shouting from their cells as he arrived.

Earlier, he walked out of his home hand in hand with his singer wife, Carla Bruni, and left in a car escorted by police on motorbikes.

“Nicolas, Nicolas! Free Nicolas,” shouted a crowd that gathered in the road outside to show support.

Sarkozy, France’s right-wing leader from 2007 to 2012, is to become the first former head of an EU country to serve time behind bars.

He was handed a five-year jail term in September for criminal conspiracy over a plan for late Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi to fund his electoral campaign.

The 70-year-old, who has appealed the verdict and denounced an “injustice,” was incarcerated in La Sante prison in Paris.

“If they absolutely want me to sleep in prison, I will sleep in prison — but with my head held high,” he told the press after his September 25 verdict.

“This is truly a sad day for France and for democracy. This trial is based on nothing,” said Flora Amanou, 41, who said she had closely followed both of Sarkozy’s presidential campaigns.

Sarkozy will be the first French leader to be incarcerated since Philippe Petain, the Nazi collaborationist head of state who was jailed after World War........

© The Times of Israel