Lafarge Cement Convicted For Paying $6.5 Million To ISIS In Syria

A Paris court has found French cement company, Lafarge, guilty of paying about $6.5 million to jihadist groups, including ISIS and the al-Qaeda-linked Nusra Front, during the Syrian civil war to keep its factory running.

The ruling is historic because it is the first time a company has been prosecuted in France for financing terrorism.

The case, which has been under investigation since 2017, also led to prison sentences for some former top executives.

Ex-CEO Bruno Lafont was handed a six-year jail term, while former deputy managing director Christian Herrault received five years.

Lafarge said it accepts the court’s decision, noting that the events happened more than ten years ago and were a clear breach of the company’s internal code of conduct.

The company, now owned by Swiss group Holcim, was also fined €1.125 million.

The company’s Syrian cement plant started operations in 2010, shortly before the country descended into civil war.

While many foreign companies pulled out by 2012, Lafarge kept the factory active and only evacuated its foreign workers, leaving Syrian staff there until September 2014, when ISIS eventually took control of the site.

During the trial, prosecutors explained that workers staying in the nearby town of Manbij had to cross the Euphrates River to reach the plant.

The court heard that Lafarge used middlemen to pay for safe passage of staff, trucks, and access to raw materials so production could continue.

Presiding judge Isabelle Prevost-Desprez said the payments were clearly made to protect Lafarge’s business interests, but in doing so they also helped strengthen extremist groups responsible for attacks in Syria and beyond, including Europe.

Prevost-Desprez said the undisclosed payments added to the seriousness of the case.

Herrault had defended the decision by saying the factory remained open partly out of concern for local employees who depended on it.

In Nigeria, Lafarge remains one of the country’s major cement producers, with an installed capacity of about 10.5 million metric tonnes per year across its four plants.

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