A French court has sentenced Bruno Lafont, the former chief executive of Lafarge, to six years in prison for financing terrorist groups in Syria to maintain the company’s operations during the country’s civil war. The ruling, delivered on April 13, orders Lafont to begin serving his sentence immediately.
The court also handed a five-year sentence to former deputy managing director Christian Herrault, while Lafarge itself now owned by Holcim was fined €1.125 million.
The case stems from payments made between 2013 and 2014, when Lafarge, through its Syrian subsidiary, transferred nearly €5.6 million to armed groups, including Islamic State and Jabhat al-Nusra. These payments were made to secure access to raw materials and ensure safe passage for company employees and transport operations.
According to the Paris court, these transactions enabled Lafarge to continue operating its cement plant in northern Syria despite escalating conflict. Presiding judge Isabelle Prévost-Desprez stated that the company effectively entered into a «commercial partnership» with terrorist organisations, contributing to their ability to finance operations both in the region and abroad.
The ruling follows earlier proceedings in the United States, where Lafarge pleaded guilty in 2022 to providing material support to designated terrorist organisations and agreed to pay a $778 million fine, the first time a corporation faced such charges.
Lafarge had completed construction of its €680 million plant in Jalabiya in 2010, shortly before the outbreak of the Syrian civil war in 2011 amid protests against President Bashar al-Assad. While many multinational companies withdrew from Syria in 2012, Lafarge continued operations, evacuating only foreign staff and keeping local employees on site until the facility was seized by Islamic State fighters in 2014.
Prosecutors argued that Lafont authorised the decision to keep the plant operational despite clear risks, describing the strategy as driven solely by profit. The court found that eight former employees were involved in financing terrorist organisations, issuing sentences ranging from 18 months to seven years. Among them, Syrian intermediary Firas Tlass was sentenced in absentia to seven years in prison.
French counterterrorism prosecutors emphasised that the company’s actions were aimed at preserving commercial interests, despite the known involvement of extremist groups controlling the region.
Holcim, which acquired Lafarge in 2015, has stated it had no knowledge of the activities in Syria at the time. Meanwhile, a separate legal case concerning potential complicity in crimes against humanity remains ongoing.