French former president Nicolas Sarkozy has been ordered to stand trial for influence peddling over accusations he offered to help a prosecutor get promoted in return for leaked information about a separate criminal inquiry.
Sarkozy, who is embroiled in several criminal investigations, denies any wrongdoing and has vowed to have all cases dismissed. His lawyers said they would appeal Thursday's decision to try him.
"Nicolas Sarkozy will calmly wait for the result of the motion for a declaration of invalidity. He does not doubt that once again the truth will triumph," his lawyers said in a statement.
His appeal will be heard on June 25, it said.
The case came about after investigators used phone-taps to examine separate allegations that late Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi funded Sarkozy's campaign. The investigators began to suspect the former president had kept tabs on a separate case through a network of informants.
Thursday's development came just over a week after Sarkozy, 63, was told he was being formally treated as a suspect in the election campaign investigation.
Under French law, a suspect is not formally charged with a crime unless he is sent to trial.
Sarkozy's lawyers had previously argued that magistrates investigating the alleged secret Libyan funding exceeded their powers and went on a "fishing expedition" by tapping his conversations between September 2013 and March 2014, breaching lawyer-client privilege.
He used the mobile phone account under the alias "Paul Bismuth" only for calls with lawyer Thierry Herzog.
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