Region: Guinea

A court in Geneva has found Israeli-French billionaire Beny Steinmetz guilty of paying bribes to secure mining rights in Guinea – allegations that have also been the subject of ICSID and LCIA arbitrations.

22 January 2021

An LCIA award worth US$2 billion that made findings of corruption in a dispute over an iron-ore mining project in Guinea has become public after being submitted to the US courts for enforcement.

25 April 2019

A US$10 billion action brought against US-Hungarian philanthropist George Soros by Beny Steinmetz Group Resources has been stayed by a New York court pending the outcome of the mining group’s ICSID arbitration against Guinea.

30 November 2017

A US appeals court has refused to enforce an award against Guinea that was set aside by a West African court after the arbitrators negotiated a fee rise.

07 July 2017

The French Court of Cassation has said that a subsidiary of French group NCT Necotrans is liable to pay Guinea’s unpaid fees from their OHADA arbitration – ruling that the parties still have liability to jointly pay costs even though the institutional rules are silent on the issue.

13 February 2017

After GAR reported a failed attempt to unseat a tribunal hearing an ICSID claim against Guinea, it has emerged that the panel presided over by Gabrielle Kaufmann-Kohler was cleared by the World Bank president of violating due process and prejudging a case when it refused to make a supplementary order for the production of documents related to mining rights.

06 January 2017

A group of mining companies linked to Israeli billionaire Beny Steinmetz has failed to unseat all three members of an ICSID tribunal hearing its US$5 billion claim against Guinea over mining rights – while a multi-jurisdictional criminal investigation has led to the arrest of Steinmetz and others who have appeared as witnesses in the case.

05 January 2017

UPDATED: A group of mining companies linked to Israeli billionaire Beny Steinmetz has challenged all three members of an ICSID tribunal, alleging that they refused to order the production of documents crucial to its US$5 billion case against Guinea.

14 November 2016

After seeing a contractual award in its favour controversially set aside in West Africa, French port investor Getma International has suffered a further blow in its dispute with Guinea when an ICSID tribunal rejected jurisdiction over all but a small part of an investment claim.

24 August 2016