A French-Israeli diamond tycoon has been convicted of corruption charges linked to mining rights deals in Guinea and multimillion-dollar bribes to the wife of the African country’s former president.
Beny Steinmetz was sentenced to five years in prison after he and two colleagues were convicted of paying $8.5 million to Mamadie Toure, the widow of Lansana Conte.
The money was meant to help secure rights to Guinea’s Simandou iron ore mine, the court in Geneva, Switzerland, heard.
Steinmetz’s investments in African mining have sparked previous investigations but this is his first conviction.
His lawyers argued he had only met Ms Toure once and never ordered anyone to pay her.
That argument was rejected by Judge Alexandra Banna and the two other judges.
“The fact that Steinmetz wasn’t aware of all details doesn’t change a thing,” the judge ruled. “Steinmetz had his hand on the payments and was able to oversee the bribery process.”
Steinmetz, 64, was also ordered to pay a $50m fine.
Two other defendants in the case, a French businessman and a Belgian administrator of companies controlled by Steinmetz, were also found guilty of corruption.
Defence lawyer Marc Bonnant said he would appeal the court ruling, calling it a “big injustice” and criticising the use of Ms Toure as a co-operating witness.
Steinmetz “never took part in a bribery pact”, Mr Bonnant said. “There was never any consideration given to the fragility of the testimony of the crown witnesses.”
He was referring principally to Ms Toure, who co-operated with a US investigation into the Guinea project. Mr Steinmetz said her pretrial evidence contained “lies”.
The plot, dating to the mid-2000s, involved Steinmetz’s BSGR Group squeezing out a rival for mining rights for vast iron ore deposits in Guinea’s south-eastern Simandou region.
The Geneva prosecutor’s office alleged that Steinmetz and two other defendants engaged in the corruption of foreign officials and falsification of documents to hide the paying of bribes from authorities and banks.
Some of the funds allegedly transited through Switzerland, and the case has been investigated in Europe, Africa and the US.
The prosecutor’s office said that starting in 2005, Steinmetz crafted a pact of corruption with Mr Conte, who ruled the West African country from 1984 until his death in 2008, and his fourth wife, Mamadie Toure, involving the payment of nearly $10m.
In its court filing, the prosecutor’s office said BSGR won exploration and exploitation licences in Guinea between 2006 and 2010 in the Simandou region, and its competitor, Anglo-Australian mining group Rio Tinto, was “deprived between July and December 2008 of concessions it had up to then held in the Simandou North blocs 1 and 2”.
Swiss transparency group Public Eye said Steinmetz employed “opaque structures” to hide the schemes that were managed from Geneva, where he lived until 2016.
The group said the case showed how tax havens can be used to conceal questionable, “even illegal” activities in countries with weak leadership and regulation.
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The Voice of Hind Rajab
Starring: Saja Kilani, Clara Khoury, Motaz Malhees
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The drill
Recharge as needed, says Mat Dryden: “We try to make it a rule that every two to three months, even if it’s for four days, we get away, get some time together, recharge, refresh.” The couple take an hour a day to check into their businesses and that’s it.
Stick to the schedule, says Mike Addo: “We have an entire wall known as ‘The Lab,’ covered with colour-coded Post-it notes dedicated to our joint weekly planner, content board, marketing strategy, trends, ideas and upcoming meetings.”
Be a team, suggests Addo: “When training together, you have to trust in each other’s abilities. Otherwise working out together very quickly becomes one person training the other.”
Pull your weight, says Thuymi Do: “To do what we do, there definitely can be no lazy member of the team.”
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Matches to be announced
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Friday, Sept 26 – UAE won by 36 runs
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How to wear a kandura
Dos
- Wear the right fabric for the right season and occasion
- Always ask for the dress code if you don’t know
- Wear a white kandura, white ghutra / shemagh (headwear) and black shoes for work
- Wear 100 per cent cotton under the kandura as most fabrics are polyester
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- Wear hamdania for work, always wear a ghutra and agal
- Buy a kandura only based on how it feels; ask questions about the fabric and understand what you are buying
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Sole survivors
- Cecelia Crocker was on board Northwest Airlines Flight 255 in 1987 when it crashed in Detroit, killing 154 people, including her parents and brother. The plane had hit a light pole on take off
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Women’s World T20, Asia Qualifier
UAE results
Beat China by 16 runs
Lost to Thailand by 10 wickets
Beat Nepal by five runs
Beat Hong Kong by eight wickets
Beat Malaysia by 34 runs
Standings (P, W, l, NR, points)
1. Thailand 5 4 0 1 9
2. UAE 5 4 1 0 8
3. Nepal 5 2 1 2 6
4. Hong Kong 5 2 2 1 5
5. Malaysia 5 1 4 0 2
6. China 5 0 5 0 0
Final
Thailand v UAE, Monday, 7am
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Send “thenational” to the following numbers or call the hotline on: 0502955999
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Eoin Morgan (capt), Moeen Ali, Jofra Archer, Jonny Bairstow, Jos Buttler (wkt), Tom Curran, Liam Dawson, Liam Plunkett, Adil Rashid, Joe Root, Jason Roy, Ben Stokes, James Vince, Chris Woakes, Mark Wood
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Engine: 3.4-litre twin-turbo V6 plus supplementary electric motor
Power: 464hp at 5,200rpm
Torque: 790Nm from 2,000-3,600rpm
Transmission: 10-speed auto
Fuel consumption: 11.7L/100km
On sale: Now
Price: From Dh590,000
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Engine: 4.0-litre V8 twin-turbocharged and three electric motors
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Torque: 730Nm at 4,000-7,000rpm
Transmission: 8-speed dual-clutch automatic
Fuel consumption: 11.2L/100km
On sale: Now, deliveries expected later in 2025
Price: expected to start at Dh1,432,000
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Engine: Electric single motor (96kW), twin motor (106kW) and twin motor performance (106kW)
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Torque: 480Nm, 670Nm, 870Nm
On sale: Later in 2025 or early 2026, depending on region
Price: Exact regional pricing TBA
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- Evacuations were paused after a student already in France posted anti-Semitic content and was subsequently expelled to Qatar
- The Foreign Ministry launched a review to determine how authorities failed to detect the posts before her entry
- Artists and researchers fall under a programme called Pause that began in 2017
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Favourite superhero: Batman
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