Lthe French cement plant Lafarge He pleaded guilty Tuesday in the United States to paying millions of dollars to the Islamic State group so that a factory in Syria could remain open during the war.
The indictment and acceptance of a $778 million fine for supporting jihadist groups in Syria was filed by the US Attorney for the Eastern District of New York, Breon Peace:“Today I am announcing the historic guilty pleas of two companies for conspiring to provide material support to foreign terrorist organizations. The two companies are Lafarge SA and Lafarge Cement Syria SA The foreign terrorist organizations are the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham, or better said known as ISIS and the al-Nusra Front or ANF.”
The Deputy Attorney General of the United States, Lisa Monaco, He pointed out among the aggravating circumstances, the brutality of the Islamists and the cover-up of the French cement company:“Lafarge also concealed its association with these terrorists through a web of bogus contracts, falsified invoices, corrupt intermediaries and off-system email accounts. (…) In the summer of 2014, the world watched in horror as ISIS was murdering innocent journalists and aid workers. That same summer, Lafarge was in business with ISIS securing profits and market share and capitalizing on the group’s brutality.”
The United States Department of Justice described this case as the first of its kind in which they have intervened and resolved, and stressed that “There is no justification for a multinational company to authorize payments to a terrorist organization.”
