The European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg has ruled that Maurice Papon, the only Frenchman convicted of complicity in crimes against humanity for his role in the deportation of Jews during the second World War, received an unfair trial. Seven judges awarded Mr Papon nearly €30,000 in costs. France has three months to challenge the decision.
Mr Papon (91), has been imprisoned since late 1999. An assize court in Bordeaux sentenced him to 10 years in prison in April 1998.
Because of his age, Mr Papon was freed on the second day of his six-month trial and lived in a luxury hotel while Jewish survivors of the Nazi Holocaust recounted the deportation of 1,560 Jews to death camps in convoys organised by Mr Papon.
Legal proceedings against Mr Papon were initiated in 1981, but as a former finance minister with friends in high places, he evaded trial on technicalities for nearly two decades. Even after his trial, Mr Papon remained free for 18 months pending his appeal to the court of cassation.
On the eve of his hearing in October 1999, he fled to the exclusive Swiss resort of Gstaad, carrying large amounts of cash. His lawyers' appeal was declared null and void because French law required appellants to turn themselves in. That was repealed in June 2000.
The Strasbourg court considers the right to appeal an integral part of a fair trial, in accordance with article 6 of the European Convention of Human Rights.
The former justice minister, Mr Robert Badinter, who is Jewish, and ageing former Resistance fighters, provoked a public debate last year when they said Mr Papon should be freed.
On July 24th, a French parole judge turned down Mr Papon's request for early release because of his weak heart, saying he has shown no sign of rehabilitation.
Mr Papon has never admitted guilt. He gave his money to family members before his trial, then refused to pay €1 million to Jewish survivors on the grounds he was insolvent. A recent decision by the Council of State said the government should pay half the compensation, since it shared responsibility with Mr Papon.
Mr Papon's trial was considered the trial of the collaborationist Vichy regime. Before July 1995, when President Jacques Chirac recognised the guilt of the French state in a speech commemorating the Vél d'Hiv deportations, official France said the Nazis were solely to blame for the extermination of tens of thousands of French Jews.
Mr Chirac three times refused to pardon Mr Papon. The Prime Minister, Mr Jean-Pierre Raffarin, repeated Mr Chirac's apology to French Jews at a ceremony on July 21st.
Mr Serge Klarsfeld, the president of the Association of Sons and Daughters of French Deportees, said he did not believe Mr Papon would be freed soon.
"Because of what he did, he must stay in prison, so that people realise the seriousness of crimes against humanity. Despite the fact that he was chief of police under Gen de Gaulle for 10 years, despite the fact he was a minister under Giscard d'Estaing, despite the fact that he is almost 92 year old, he is in prison. That makes people believe in justice."