A Paris court handed down prison sentences to two businessmen convicted of arms trade with Angola, concluding a case yesterday that tried over forty defendants, including senior politicians and civil servants.

The court sentenced French businessmen Pierre Falcone and Arcadi Gaydamak to six years each for arranging the shipment of weapons valued at $790 million to Angola in the mid-1990s. Mr. Falcone immediately appealed the ruling, his lawyer told the Wall Street Journal. The Moscow-born Mr. Gaydamak, who also has Israeli citizenship, didn’t attend the trial and is the target of an international arrest warrant. His lawyer said he was also considering lodging an appeal.

The court handed down sentences to 36 of the 42 defendants — including fines and suspended prison sentences — the harshest going to the two businessmen.According to the WSJ and of which we agree, the verdicts could have significant geopolitical implications. Angola, which has emerged as a frontier for big oil companies eager to tap into its vast offshore reserves, has said the investigation could indeed harm its relationship with France.

As excerpted from the WSJ:

At the start of the trial last year, Angola asked through a lawyer that the case be dismissed on the grounds that most of the facts uncovered by the French-led investigation were covered by Angola’s secret defense.

In their Tuesday verdict, French judges rejected Angola’s motion and said the Paris court was competent to rule in the arms-export case. Judges also said Mr. Falcone couldn’t invoke diplomatic immunity because his Angolan passport was issued in 2003, long after the arms deal. A Paris lawyer for Angola didn’t return calls seeking comment.

Mr. Falcone, who began his professional life as a snail salesman in southern France, has acknowledged playing a role in organizing arms-for-oil trade between weapons suppliers in Eastern Europe and oil companies in Angola, according to court documents. But Mr. Falcone has said that he acted on an official mandate from the Angolan government and that France had no say in the transaction because the weapons never transited through French territory.

Judges found Mr. Falcone guilty of influence-peddling, saying he used proceeds from the arms-for-oil trade to pay commissions to French politicians and civil servants in return for favors.

French conservative senator and former interior minister Charles Pasqua was sentenced to three years in prison, two of them suspended, for influence-peddling in connection with the arms trade of Messrs. Falcone and Gaydamak. Mr. Pasqua said in a statement that he had no reason to be a party to this case and that he will appeal the sentence, which included a €100,000 ($148,650) fine.

Jean-Christophe Mitterrand, son of late Socialist President François Mitterrand, was found guilty of abuse of company funds and fined €375,000 for collecting payments from Mr. Falcone. Judges dismissed charges of complicity in arms trade against Mr. Mitterrand.

“I was found innocent of this very serious accusation,” Mr. Mitterrand said in a telephone interview. He said he had collected about €1.3 million from Mr. Falcone for providing him with advice on oil deals in Africa over several years.