French cement maker Lafarge to face trial on terrorism funding charges

PARIS (Reuters) - Cement maker Holcim's Lafarge will face trial in a French court on charges that its Syrian subsidiary financed terrorism and breached European sanctions in order to keep a plant operating, France's anti-terrorism prosecutor and a lead plaintiff said.

Lafarge, which became part of Swiss-listed Holcim in 2015, has been the subject of an investigation into its operations in Syria since 2016, one of the most extensive corporate criminal proceedings in recent French legal history.

Investigative judges in Paris gave the order Lafarge face trial on Wednesday.

In a statement to Reuters on Thursday, Lafarge said it acknowledged the decision of the investigating judges.

Holcim shares fell nearly 2% in late Wednesday trading after the news, before recovering a little to close 0.7% lower.

Investigations continue into allegations that Lafarge was complicit in crimes against humanity, part of the wider probe into how the group kept its factory running in Syria after war broke out in 2011, said the anti-corruption group Sherpa, which brought the criminal complaint against Lafarge.

France's highest court in January rejected a request from Lafarge that charges of complicity in crimes against humanity be dropped from the investigation.

The sanctions breach charges relate to a European ban on financial or commercial links to Islamist militant groups Islamic State and Al-Nusra, Sherpa said.

In a separate investigation in the United States, Lafarge admitted in 2022 that its Syrian subsidiary paid groups designated by Washington as terrorists, including Islamic State, to help protect staff at the plant in a country shaken by years of civil war.

(Reporting by Dominique Patton in Paris, Sudip Kar-Gupta in Brussels and John Revill in Zurich; Writing by Richard Lough; Editing by Mark Potter)