This step is the logical continuation of the formal notice issued to BNP Paribas on October 26 by these same associations, Les Amis de la Terre, Oxfam France and Notre affaires à tous.

The angle of attack before the Paris court is identical: a possible breach of the "duty of vigilance" - a reason already used for example against TotalEnergies, but tested for the first time against a bank.

"Faced with its significant contribution to climate change, the associations are asking BNP Paribas to end its financial support for new fossil energy projects and to adopt an exit plan from oil and gas", write the three NGOs in a joint statement, calling for a "historic trial".

In practice, a bailiff appeared in the morning at the headquarters of BNP Paribas in order to deliver the summons in good and due form, confirms the bank.

The timetable for the next steps should be set on June 13.

François de Cambiaire, associate lawyer at the firm Seattle and counsel for associations, expects the procedure to take two or three years.

The spokespersons of the three associations symbolically posed with a fake envelope crossed out with the "assignment" stamp in front of a BNP Paribas branch located not far from the Opéra Garnier and the bank's head office in Paris.

Historical funder

Since 2017, the French law on the duty of vigilance requires large companies to take effective measures to prevent human rights and environmental abuses throughout their chain of activity.

In a reaction sent to AFP on Wednesday, BNP Paribas said it "regrets" the "litigious path rather than the path of dialogue".

"We have already done more than half of the way", commented on the microphone of France Inter the director of corporate engagement of BNP Paribas Antoine Sire, "since ten years ago we had almost only fossil fuels, today we have 55% essentially renewable low-carbon energy".

"All the same, stopping financing oil production is an extremely heavy decision," he added.

The bank had already expressed its "disagreement" with these NGOs, in a letter consulted by AFP on January 26 in response to the formal notice, which called for a response within three months.

Companies "cannot replace the legislator", then estimated the bank, saying it "deeply disagrees" with the interpretation made of the legislation on the duty of vigilance.

A response "next", according to the associations.

Historical financier of the industrial sector and energy production, the French bank announced on January 24 new climate commitments by wanting to divide by five by 2030 its financing for the oil extraction and production sector.

This assignment is in line with other NGO actions based on the "duty of vigilance".

The first, initiated in 2019 and still ongoing in Paris, targets TotalEnergies' Tilenga and EACOP oil mega-projects in Africa.

In 2021 in the Netherlands, a court condemned the oil giant Shell for the first time to accelerate its plan to reduce carbon emissions, in a procedure initiated by NGOs, including Greenpeace and Friends of the Earth.

Shell appealed.

© 2023 AFP