Story highlights A former health and sports minister accused Rafael Nadal of doping

A French tribunal found that Roselyne Bachelot defamed the Spanish tennis star

(CNN) A French tribunal on Thursday ordered a former minister of health and sports to pay tennis star Rafael Nadal $11,800 in damages for accusing him of doping.

The tribunal found that Roselyne Bachelot, who served as the minister of health and sports between 2007 and 2010, defamed the 16-time grand slam winner during a March 2016 television appearance in France.

The tennis star filed a lawsuit against Bachelot the following month , saying at the time that the case was intended "to defend my integrity and my image as an athlete, but also the values I have defended all my career."

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In a statement released Thursday by a representative of Nadal's Monaco-based PR team, the Spanish player said he also sought to prevent "any public figure from making insulting or false allegations against an athlete using the media, without any evidence or foundation and to go unpunished."

"The motivation as I have always remarked was not economical," he said.

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