Unravelling the web of corruption with Libyan roots threatening to unseat Canada’s Trudeau
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Deal-making of the Gaddafi era has now come back to haunt those who allegedly took part I them and those near them, most recently threatening to damage one of the world’s leading engineering firms and weaken or even topple the government of Canadian premier Justin Trudeau.
Trudeau’s administration stands accused of attempting to soften penalties against a Montreal-based engineering giant, SNC-Lavalin, that allegedly paid 48 million Canadian dollars in bribes to Libyan officials to win contracts in the years before Gaddafi’s downfall.
The Trudeau administration is accused by a former attorney general of pressuring officials to agree to a deferred prosecution that would spare the company, which employs 50,000 people worldwide, further damage.
Trudeau denied he exercised pressure on the prosecutor, but conceded he urged officials to consider the broader economic implications of bringing the company, which employees 9,000 Canadians, to its knees over the case.
In an investigation by The Independent, allegedly corrupt business dealings with the Gaddafi regime have already led to raids, seizures of assets, convictions and jail time in cases in the Netherlands and Norway, and deals under quiet scrutiny by prosecutors stretch the globe, involving firms in Europe, Asia, North America, and the Middle East.
Businessmen and politicians often met with Gaddafi’s sons Saif al-Islam and Saadi or surrogates such as National Oil Company chief Shokri Ghanem – Ghanem body was found floating in the Danube in on 29 April 2012, six months after Gaddafi’s death – to talk about deals, especially in the energy sector. This intensified in 2003 after the UN lifted sanctions in Libya over its nuclear programme, even catching the attention of American officials in Libya.
Former Libyan National Oil Company chief Shokri Ghanem and who was found dead on 29 April 2012.
Prosecutors are now digging through the documents and testimony to try to unravel who paid what to whom, and for what purpose.
According to Norwegian and Swiss prosecutors, Ghanem’s son Mohammed served as the alleged bag man in the case of Yara International, an Oslo-based fertiliser giant. The company wound up paying the largest corruption fine in Norwegian history and four of its executives were indicted for allegedly paying bribes to win a concession in Libya.
According to court documents Norwegian and Swiss prosecutors discovered Yara deposited at least $1.5m in a UBS account belonging to a company in the British Virgin Islands that was operated by Mohammed Ghanem.
In the Netherlands, prosecutors have for years been pursuing a case against a $700m hedge fund called Palladyne, which was operated by Ghanem’s son-in-law, Ismael Abudher. Its mandate was to manage assets of the Libyan Investment Authority, which managed Libyan public funds. documents suggesting Mr Abudher owned at least a dozen British Virgin Islands shell companies.
