The French cement manufacturer’s defense was not ironclad and Lafarge should indeed be judged in France. The Court of Cassation definitively validated this Tuesday the indictment for complicity in crimes against humanity of the company, which maintained a cement factory in Syria until 2014 despite the presence of jihadists.
Lafarge pleaded guilty in the USA
The area was then in the hands of Daesh jihadists and Lafarge is accused of having paid several million euros to various terrorist groups and intermediaries in exchange for maintaining its activities. The investigation by the French authorities assessed that these payments could have reached between 4.8 and 10 million euros for the Daesh group alone.
Also prosecuted in the United States, the company agreed in October 2022 to pay a financial penalty of $778 million and to plead guilty to having helped “terrorist” organizations in Syria, including Daesh, between 2013 and 2014.
In France, the Court of Cassation, however, definitively canceled its proceedings for endangering the lives of others, “French law not being applicable” to Syrian employees, explained the highest court of the French judiciary in a press release.