PARIS (AP) — A French judge has ordered 12 people, including a top aide to former Socialist President Francois Mitterrand, to stand trial for allegedly wiretapping leading lawyers, politicians and journalists two decades ago, judicial officials said Friday.

The long-standing case was opened in 1993 after complaints were filed against former officials at the Elysee presidential palace for alleged illegal telephone tapping between 1983 and 1986.

Investigating Judge Jean-Paul Valat did not fix a date for the trial, which is not likely to begin before 2004, the officials said, speaking on condition of anonymity.

Among those under investigation in the wiretap scandal are Gilles Menage, the late Mitterrand's former Cabinet director, and Louis Schweitzer, the Cabinet chief of former Prime Minister Laurent Fabius, now a top Socialist Party leader.

The scandal led to widespread fears in France about threats to democracy and left many wondering about the freedoms of their powerful president.

French newspapers have in the past indicated Mitterrand was behind the wiretapping of journalists investigating the sinking of a Greenpeace ship and the existence of his illegitimate daughter, Mazarine, among others.

A 1991 French law stipulates that wiretapping may be carried out only in cases involving national security, the safeguarding of information considered essential to France's scientific and economic interests and the prevention of terrorism and organized crime.