A Madrid court has sentenced former International Monetary Fund chief Rodrigo Rato to almost five years in prison for corruption offences, the court said on Friday.

Rato, who has denied any wrongdoing throughout a nine-year probe, said in a statement sent to Reuters through the law firm Baker McKenzie that the ruling was ?unfair? and that he would appeal.

Rato had already spent two years in prison over a separate embezzlement case during his tenure as chairman of Spanish lender Bankia.

Following a year-long trial, the court convicted Rato on three counts of offences against Spanish tax authorities, as well as corruption involving individuals outside the public sector, and money laundering. It sentenced him to four years, nine months and a day in prison.

Since the decision can be challenged on appeal before the Supreme Court, Rato will not have to serve any prison time for now until there is a final ruling, a court spokesperson said.

Rato, 75, who chaired the IMF from 2004 to 2007 and Bankia between 2010 and 2012, previously spent two years in prison after being convicted in 2017 over the misuse of Bankia credit cards to buy jewels, holidays and expensive clothes.

In the more recent corruption case, prosecutors had requested a total jail sentence of 63 years for the 11 charges against him.

Last year, Rato?s lawyer Maria Masso, Baker McKenzie, had asked the court to dismiss the charges, arguing that Rato?s rights had been violated during a 2015 search of his home, so evidence obtained in the raid should be annulled.

The court also ordered Rato to pay fines worth more than two million euros ($2.08 million), as well as 568,413 euros to tax authorities.

Rato, who served as deputy prime minister in the conservative People?s Party (PP) government between 1996 and 2004, was acquitted in a separate fraud trial over the listing of Bankia in 2012. (Reuters: Text, Excluding Headline)

?Former International Monetary Fund chief Rodrigo Rato, found guilty of embezzlement in 2018, leaves court after facing the first day of a new trial on charges of corruption, money laundering and tax dodging, with the prosecutor requesting a sentence of over 60 years in prison in Madrid, Spain, December 15, 2023. REUTERS/Susana Vera/File Photo

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