Highlights: Sudan: BNP knowingly maintained its operations despite embargoes, according to investigators. “BNP Paribas decided to continue banking operations with Sudan in full knowledge of the facts,” write the French investigators in their first conclusions revealed by AFP. In 2014, BNP was accused in the United States of having violated American embargoe in Sudan as well as in Cuba and Iran. The bank pleaded guilty and paid a record fine of nearly $8.9 billion.

“BNP Paribas decided to continue banking operations with Sudan in full knowledge of the facts,” write the French investigators in their first conclusions revealed by AFP.

Sudan: BNP knowingly maintained its operations despite embargoes, according to investigators

“

BNP Paribas decided to continue banking operations with Sudan in full knowledge of the facts

,” write the French investigators in their first conclusions revealed by AFP.

BNP Paribas Bank in Paris (illustrative image).

By: Nicolas Feldmann Follow

The documents seized during the searches of June 2021 in the premises of BNP Paribas, in the Paris region, and in its subsidiary, in Switzerland, are still under study, but investigators are already affirming it: while the war in Darfur raged between 2002 and 2008 - the conflict left nearly 300,000 dead and nearly 2.5 million displaced according to the UN -

the BNP knowingly maintained its operations, circumvented international rules

as well as the sanctions decreed by the UN, the United States and the European Union.

According to the first conclusions of the investigation targeting the bank, in France, for “

complicity in crimes against humanity

” in Darfur and revealed by Agence France Presse (AFP), “

BNP Paribas has decided to continue banking operations with this country

[Sudan, Editor's note]

in full knowledge of the facts, even replacing American banks for clearing

or compensation operations, according to several reports.

“

It appears from the internal documents of BNP Paribas Switzerland that the bank was aware, in real time, of the evolution of international rules

”, underline the investigators in December 2021, cited by AFP.

“

Through the circumvention of international rules, the BNP would have allowed the Sudanese authorities to finance themselves on the dollar market and to finance their crimes

”

explains Clémence Bectarte, lawyer for the International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH) to the origin of this complaint in France filed with nine Sudanese refugees and the Human Rights League (LDH).

“

When we talk about mass crimes – crimes against humanity, genocide – this requires financial means.
This is precisely what is being criticized in this complaint

,” adds Clémence Bectarte.

BNP pleads guilty and pays record fine in the United States

In 2014, BNP was accused in the United States of having violated American embargoes in Sudan as well as in Cuba and Iran.

The bank pleaded guilty and paid a record fine of nearly $8.9 billion.

“

The American judicial authorities had at the time qualified the BNP as the “de facto central bank of the Sudanese authorities”

, recounts Clémence Bectarte before adding that “

the Sudanese victims who were unable to access reparations in the United States then turned to us to initiate criminal proceedings in France, no longer on the basis of "violation of the embargo", but this time for complicity in crimes committed by the Sudanese government, while the BNP cooperated with the authorities

Contacted to react to the progress of the investigation in France revealed by AFP, the bank did not respond to requests from RFI.

Sudan: BNP knowingly maintained its operations despite embargoes, according to investigators

Sudan: BNP knowingly maintained its operations despite embargoes, according to investigators

BNP pleads guilty and pays record fine in the United States

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