About Entertainment - Magazine - Rai star jailed for abortion bid

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Cheb Mami says he is persecuted because he is a successful Arab

A French court has jailed the Algerian singer Cheb Mami for five years for abducting a former partner and forcing her to undergo an attempted abortion.

Cheb Mami, whose real name is Mohammed Khalifati, was found guilty at a trial in Bobigny, a Parisian suburb.

He had denied the charges, telling the court he had been "manipulated" by his entourage.

The singer is credited with bringing Algeria’s popular Rai folk music to an international audience.

He had faced a maximum 10 years in prison.

Prosecutors had said that Cheb Mami was one of a group who abducted and beat the woman, a French photographer, in the Algerian capital, Algiers, in 2005.

Still pregnant

They said she came to Algeria believing she was on a business trip, a few days after telling Cheb Mami, 42, that she was pregnant.

She said that she was drugged and taken to a villa in Algiers. There, three people tried to perform an abortion.

On her return to France, she discovered she was still pregnant and later gave birth to a daughter, now aged three.

France issued an international arrest warrant for Cheb Mami after he skipped bail in Paris in May 2007 and fled to Algeria.

He returned to Paris on Monday, saying he wanted to attend the trial, and was arrested at Orly airport.

He denied any involvement in the alleged abortion and said he was being persecuted because he was a successful Arab star.