By Michel Rose

PARIS (Reuters) -Former French president Nicolas Sarkozy will be put behind bars on Tuesday, starting a five-year sentence for conspiring to raise campaign funds from Libya, in a stunning downfall for a leader once known for his swagger and taste for the global spotlight.

Sarkozy, who was the conservative president of France between 2007 and 2012, will become the first former French leader to be jailed since Nazi collaborator Marshal Philippe Petain after World War Two.

“I’m not afraid of prison. I’ll keep my head held high, including at the prison gates,” Sarkozy told La Tribune Dimanche newspaper ahead of his incarceration.

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The conviction caps years of legal battles over allegations that his 2007 campaign took millions in cash

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