Families of some American servicemen who were killed fighting against ISIS in Syria are suing French cement giant Lafarge after the company pleaded guilty to making payments to the terrorist group.
A lawsuit launched by the families of three US servicemen killed in attacks on ISIS says: “The defendants’ payments and their business partnership with ISIS provided the organization with what it needed to transform itself from a militia in early 2010 to a brutal terrorist giant with the ability and intent to kill Americans.”
Lafarge, a French company that was at the time among the largest in the world, pleaded guilty and was ordered to pay a fine of nearly $800 million in October after the company faced the first-ever US government prosecution of a corporation for supporting terrorism, according to Fox News.
Lafarge built a $680 million plant in northern Syria in 2011 but soon began to face competition from companies importing cheaper cement, according to the Justice Ministry.
Prosecutors had accused the company of turning a blind eye to the actions of the armed ISIS groups it was working with, saying that the financial deals concluded were not motivated by ideological alignment with terrorist groups, but rather an attempt to secure an economic advantage.
