British oil company investigated for corruption in Somalia
Soma Oil and Gas, a private company chaired by Lord Michael Howard, on Monday denied paying more than half a billion dollars to government officials to protect an oil exploration deal signed in 2013.
Britain's Serious Fraud Office (SFO) said on Friday it had opened a criminal investigation into Soma following allegations of corruption in Somalia.
The allegations stem from investigations carried out by the United Nations Monitoring Group on Somalia and Eritrea, set up to detail infringements of arms embargoes on the countries.
The investigators say that $690,000 (€630,000) worth of payments were suspicious. They allege that at least $580,000 paid since June 2014 as part of a "capacity building programme" may have been corrupt payments to Somali government officials.
An April 2014 "side letter" from Soma to Somalia's petroleum minister said the company would pay salaries and equipment costs to support the exploration programme up to a total of $400,000. The agreement was extended in April 2015, since when a further $90,000 has allegedly been paid.
A further $100,000 was paid for a "data room" to store and analyse seismic data but which has not been built. The allegations were contained in a 28-page report put to the UN Security Council's sanctions committee on Monday.
Source: AFP