BNP BNP Paribas

By Noemie Bisserbe 

PARIS -- Human rights groups representing victims of the Darfur genocide filed a criminal complaint Thursday against BNP Paribas SA alleging the French bank provided financial services to Sudan that propped up its regime.

Four years ago, Europe's largest listed bank by assets agreed to pay nearly $9 billion and plead guilty to violating sanctions against Sudan, Iran and Cuba, in an unprecedented settlement with U.S. authorities. BNP Paribas acknowledged using regional banks overseas to process more than $20 billion in financial transactions linked to companies and government agencies in Sudan, when the nation was engaged in what the U.S. and other countries labeled genocide.

The genocide's Sudanese victims never received any damages, however.

"To this day, they have been denied the possibility of justice," said Mossaad M. Ali, the executive director of African Center for Justice and Peace Studies, a Sudanese human rights organization and plaintiff in the case.

BNP Paribas said it wasn't aware of the complaint and that the bank doesn't comment on judicial procedures.

The complaint threatens to reopen a difficult chapter for BNP Paribas, which was the target of a U.S. investigation that threw the Paris-based lender into unprecedented turmoil. Under French law, prosecutors are required to act on the complaint by opening a preliminary investigation. Such a probe can end in dismissal or lead to the involvement of an investigating magistrate with the power to file charges and seek fines.

The settlement with U.S. authorities, announced in June 2014, marked the largest-ever fine paid by a bank for violations of U.S. economic sanctions, and imposed other penalties rarely used against financial institutions, including a year-long ban on the French bank's ability to conduct certain U.S. dollar transactions.

"We deeply regret the past misconduct that led to this settlement," BNP Paribas CEO Jean-Laurent Bonnafé said at the time. "The failures that have come to light in the course of this investigation run contrary to the principles on which BNP Paribas has always sought to operate."

Prosecutors, in laying out their case against the bank in 2014, said BNP essentially acted as the "Central Bank of Sudan in Dollar Transactions" between 2002 and 2008.

"BNP allowed the government to function, pay its staff, military and security forces, make purchases abroad, all while Sudan was a pariah on the international scene for planning and committing crimes in Darfur," said Patrick Baudouin, a lawyer for the International Federation of Human Rights, another plaintiff, on Thursday.

Write to Noemie Bisserbe at noemie.bisserbe@wsj.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

September 26, 2019 10:15 ET (14:15 GMT)

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