Nicolas Sarkozy has made history as the first former French president to be imprisoned, beginning a five-year sentence for allegedly conspiring to finance his election campaign using funds from the late Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi.

Not since the incarceration of Philippe Pétain, leader of France's Nazi collaborationist regime during World War Two, who was jailed for treason in 1945 has a former French head of state been sent to prison.

On Tuesday morning, Sarkozy, now 70, was driven into La Santé prison, a 19th-century facility located in Paris’s Montparnasse district, just south of the River Seine. The area was heavily secured, with dozens of police officers cordoning off nearby streets due to the high-profile nature of his arrival.

He is being held in the prison’s isolation wing for his own safety, as many of the other inmates are convicted drug traffickers or individuals serving sentences for terrorism-related offenses. Sarkozy has insisted he expects no preferential treatment during his incarceration.

As he left his villa in Paris’s upscale 16th arrondissement, hand-in-hand with his wife Carla Bruni-Sarkozy, many supporters gathered to applaud and chant his name: "Nicolas!" His 28-year-old son Louis had earlier called on supporters to rally in his father's defense, while another son, Pierre, urged for a message of "nothing else, please" but love.

Despite being behind bars, Sarkozy maintains his innocence in what remains a divisive scandal involving alleged Libyan campaign financing. Just before arriving at the prison, he posted a message on X stating: "I have no doubt. Truth will prevail. But how crushing the price will have been".

"With unwavering strength I tell the French people, it is not a former president they are locking up this morning, it is an innocent man," he wrote. "Do not feel sorry for me because my wife and my children are by my side... but this morning I feel deep sorrow for a France humiliated by a will for revenge."

Sarkozy served as president from 2007 to 2012 and has appealed the prison sentence. His legal team has filed for his release. According to his lawyer, Christophe Ingrain, “He’ll be inside for at least three weeks or a month.” Ingrain added that there was no justification for his client’s imprisonment.