Paris – April 24th 2017 – Successive departures of Bruno Lafont and Eric Olsen from Lafarge are the first significant steps of the company towards the recognition of its liability’s. They may try to reinsure the shareholders but the company will still have to answer about its conducts in Syria before the investigating judge soon to be seized following Sherpa’s complaint filed on November 15th for funding terrorism, complicity in war crimes and crimes against humanity.
The internal report, by admitting the French management’s involvement, confirms the evidences included in Sherpa’s complaint: the parent company was the final decider for the human rights violations perpetrated in Syria.
In that sense, we are pleased by the final adoption of the French duty of care bill’s and the approval by the Constitutional Court on March 23rd: these legal provisions will now obstruct such a lack of vigilance from a parent company on its supply chain. We hope they’ll establish a fairer globalization during the next parliamentary term.
“Soft law” solutions proposed once again by Lafarge after this scandal – particularly the new ethical committee’s creation – are way insufficient and demonstrated their inefficiency. The involvement of economic actors in funding terrorism and other serious human rights violations have to be judged according to hard low in order to ensure justice for affected populations.
For more information: presse@asso-sherpa.org
