PARIS, Feb. 3 (UPI) -- Former French Prime Minister Alain Juppe said Tuesday he will remain in politics while appealing his verdict in a political corruption case.
On Friday, Juppe was given an 18-month suspended sentence in a decade-old fake jobs scandal at Paris city hall.
The sentence would automatically bar him from politics for a decade.
"I will appeal ... and as the appeal is (under way) I will continue to exercise my responsibilities," said Juppe, who is currently the mayor of Bordeaux, a member of French Parliament and head of the ruling center-right Union for a Popular Movement Party of French President Jacques Chirac.
In making the announcement on French evening evening news, Juppe essentially went back on an earlier pledge to retire from politics if found guilty.
The scandal also casts a cloud overChirac, who was mayor of Paris at the time.
