‘Mining Tycoon Steinmetz On Trial Over Guinea Bribes’ 15 January 2021

Mining tycoon Beny Steinmetz has appeared in a Geneva court where he is facing trial for allegedly paying bribes to win lucrative mining rights in Guinea. Swiss prosecutors accuse Israeli-French mining magnate Beny Steinmetz and two others of having paid $10 million in bribes to obtain permits for lucrative iron-ore deposits in Guinea. The three are also accused of forging documents to cover up the bribery. Appearing in court in Geneva earlier this week, 64-year-old Steinmetz denied any role in the corruption or forgery linked to the exploration rights in the remote Simandou mountains in Guinea's southwest. In court, Steinmetz referred to himself as the "spokesperson" or ambassador for the company Beny Steinmetz Group Resources (BSGR), Reuters news agency reports. He had never presented himself at the boss or taken decisions on projects, he said in the trial, which started on Monday.

…The mining magnate is charged with paying at least $8.5 million (€7 million) in bribes to Mamadie Toure. Toure is one of the four wives of Lansana Conte, who ruled Guinea from 1984 until his death in 2008. The money was allegedly paid through shell companies and other opaque corporate constructions to the country's presidential family. This allegedly helped Steinmetz's BSGR company secure iron ore exploration rights in Guinea's Simandou mountains valued at around $5bn for the much lower sum of $165m. The 110-km (68 miles)-long Simandou range is thought to hold one of of the world's riches deposits of iron ore, a key ingredient in steelmaking. The bribes were also allegedly aimed at outmanoeuvring British-Australian competitor Rio Tinto to obtain the rights.

…The size of the iron deposit at Simandou means it had the potential to transform Guinea's economy but the legal wrangles over the license, together with the difficulty and cost of access to the remote region, mean it has yet to be developed. "The Steinmetz affair is a sad illustration of what is called the resource curse -- that is that a country as rich in natural resources as Guinea is trapped in extreme and paradoxical poverty," said spokesperson Geraldine Viret from Public Eye, a Swiss NGO that monitors the country's commodities sector. "It also shows the devastating consequences of the lack of transparency that corporate groups and companies exploit to reap gigantic profits on the backs of developing countries," Viret told DW.mThe trial is being closely followed in Guinea. "The most important thing for Guinea is to put an end to corruption in the mining sector," said Dansa Kourouma, director of the National Council of Civil Society Organizations in Guinea. "We are watching closely to see what lessons the Guinean state will learn from this process for future contract negotiations.