France/Syria: A court in Paris has found Lafarge, now part of Holcim, guilty of charges that its Syrian subsidiary financed terrorism and breached EU sanctions to keep a cement plant operating in northern Syria during the country's civil war.

The case was the first time a company has been tried for – and found guilty of - financing terrorism in France. ECCHR and Sherpa, the two organisations that filed the initial lawsuit, called it “A historic decision in the fight against multinational corporations' impunity.”

A total of eight former Lafarge employees were found guilty. They include its former CEO Bruno Lafont, who has been sentenced to six years in jail. His lawyer said that he would appeal, as did the lawyer for Christian Herrault, Lafarge’s former deputy managing director, who was sentenced to five years. Firas Tlass, a Syrian ex-member of staff who made the payments to the jihadist groups, was sentenced to seven years in jail in absentia. It was not immediately clear whether Tlass and the other former employees found guilty would also appeal.

Judges determined that Lafarge in total paid €5.59m to extremist ⁠groups, including ISIS and the al-Qaeda-affiliated Nusra Front, both designated as terrorists by the European Union, between 2013 and September 2014. Isabelle Prevost-Desprez, the Presiding Judge, said that the payments made by Lafarge helped to strengthen extremist groups that carried out deadly attacks in Syria and beyond. "It is clear to the court that the sole purpose of the funding of a terrorist organisation was to keep the Syrian plant running for economic reasons. Payments to terrorist entities enabled Lafarge to continue its operations," Prevost-Desprez said. "These ⁠payments took the form of a genuine commercial partnership with the ISIS.”

Lafarge has been ordered to pay a €1.125m fine, the maximum penalty available for a company, as prosecutors had requested. "Lafarge SA acknowledges the court's finding, which concerns a legacy matter involving conduct that occurred more than a decade ago and was in flagrant violation of Lafarge's Code of Conduct," the company said in a statement. "The decision is an important milestone in Lafarge SA’s actions to address this legacy matter responsibly and the company is reviewing the court’s reasoning." Holcim did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The Jalabiya ⁠plant, located in northern ⁠Syria and bought by Lafarge in 2008 for US$680m, began operating in 2010, just a few months before the beginning of the Syrian uprising in early 2011. The court found more than €800,000 was paid to secure safe passage for employees over the Euphrates River, while €1.6m was used to buy raw materials from quarries that were under ISIS control.

In a separate case in the US in 2022, Lafarge admitted that its Syrian subsidiary paid US$6m to ISIS and the Nusra Front to allow employees, customers and suppliers to pass through checkpoints after civil conflict broke out in Syria. The group has already paid US$778m in forfeiture and fines as part of its US plea agreement. Lafarge is also under investigation in France for complicity in crimes against humanity over how the company kept its factory running in Syria.

Bolivia: Congressman Juan Cruz has requested reports on the operations of the Public Production Company Cementos de Bolivia (Ecebol) due to a cement shortage in Oruro, where the company operates a cement plant. In an interview, Cruz asked “Why is there a shortage, and why isn’t there cement for Oruro? Cement is only arriving from other departments and even from another country. The public is asking: what has happened to the cement plant? I’m going to request that information and I’d also like to visit the Ecebol plant again.”

Regarding a recently presented list of state-owned companies operating at a loss, which includes Ecebol, the congressman suggested that the government could be making Ecebol appear unprofitable in order to sell it ‘for a song.’ From his perspective, this should not happen; rather, the company should be revitalised and continue to be monitored to ensure its proper operation.

India: Cement manufacturers in India are likely to witness a sharp decline in profitability in the current 2027 financial year (FY2027), as elevated energy costs weigh on margins, according to a report by Crisil Intelligence. The report estimates that operating margins of companies in the sector will contract by 150-200 basis points (bps) year-on-year to 16-18% in FY2027, reversing the 260-280 bps increase seen in the previous year.

The decline is primarily attributed to a surge in energy prices triggered by geopolitical tensions in West Asia, which have significantly increased power and fuel expenses, a key cost component accounting for 26-28% of the sector’s costs. Crisil noted that power and fuel costs are expected to rise by 10-12% year-on-year, driven by higher prices of crude oil, petcoke, and thermal coal.

Brent crude prices surged sharply in recent months and are projected to remain elevated and volatile, averaging US$82-87/barrel over the course of FY2027. Additionally, industrial diesel prices rose by around 25% month-on-month in March 2026, adding further pressure through higher logistics and raw material procurement costs.

"Geopolitical disruptions will intensify cost pressures for cement makers in the first half of FY2027. A surge in energy prices, along with moderate increases in raw material and freight costs, will push total costs up by 4-6%," said Sehul Bhatt, Director, Crisil Intelligence.

France: Low-carbon cement producer Hoffmann Green Cement Technologies has announced that it has strengthened its partnership with Groupe Angevin through a new agreement with its subsidiary Angevin Île-de-France. The collaboration, focused on structural works in the Île-de-France region, will build on an initial partnership launched in September 2025 with other Angevin subsidiaries in western France. The agreement includes multi-year volume commitments and expands the application of the companies’ collaboration in structural construction.

Groupe Angevin, a family-owned construction group founded in 1936 that has operated for nearly 90 years, is active across western France and the Île-de-France region, delivering projects across industrial, civil engineering, housing and renewable energy segments. The group operates through an integrated network of subsidiaries enabling end-to-end project execution.