A subsidiary of French’s largest wine producer, Castel Group, negotiated with a violent militia group in the Central African Republic to have its sugar operations and market shares in the country protected, a US graft watchdog has revealed.

Castel Group, a family-owned food and beverage empire with some 240 subsidiaries in 50 countries ranks as the third-largest wine producer globally, second-largest brewer in Africa and a major bottling partner for Coca-Cola in Africa.

According to The Sentry’s investigations, SUCAF RCA negotiated a security arrangement with the Union for Peace (UPC) one of the largest militia groups in the Central African Republic to have its factory and sugar cane fields protected and to ensure free movement on key roads necessary for the provision of supplies in the late 2014.

Security upheaval

This was at a time when the country was at the height of political and security upheaval following renewed violence in the CAR.

The aim of the agreement was to have UPC ensure that SUCAF RCA retains its decades-long monopoly of sugar distribution as well as forced seizure of smuggled sugar mostly from Sudan.

The report notes that the company’s financial and kind support to UPC that included vehicle maintenance and fuel provision lasted till March this year.

 “To protect its market, SUCAF RCA set up a sophisticated, informal system to finance the violent militias through direct and indirect cash payments, as well as through in-kind support in the form of vehicle maintenance and fuel provision,” the report says.

In addition to that, the two parties also reportedly agreed to set up two roadblocks that allow its militia to collect taxes every time trucks belonging to SUCAF RCA's business partners or subcontractors pass between the sugar factory and the town of Bambari, which is an obligatory point of passage to CAR’s capital, Bangui.

The United Nations (UN) has in the past linked UPC militias to mass atrocities that may constitute war crimes and crimes against humanity since their inception in the late 2014.

They include; mass killings, abductions, torture, child soldier recruitment, and sexual and gender-based violence.

“In November 2018, the UPC was also responsible for a brutal attack on a camp of 18,000 displaced people in the town of Alindao that resulted in the massacre of over 112 civilians, most of them women and children,” notes UN peace keeping mission MINUSCA.

The Sentry report indicates that UPC’s self-proclaimed General Ali Darassa and his confidant at the time of the Alindao attack, Mr Hassan Bouba- the current Minister of Livestock and Animal Health hold responsibility for the massacre and were the primary beneficiaries of the financial agreement with SUCAF RCA.

Payments made by the sugar company to the two UPC leaders account for a total of about USD258,000 over five years, as calculated by The Sentry.

“Since the end of 2014, Darassa has reportedly been paid cash—nearly about USD31,000 annually until early 2021, while his number two and former political coordinator, Hassan Bouba, received about USD20,000 yearly until 2019. Payments to Bouba have stopped since he was removed from his position as the UPC political coordinator in early 2021,” notes the report.

The future of the deal however, remains uncertain due to the deployment of governmental and Russian forces in territories formerly controlled by the UPC.

In a statement sent to newsrooms, John Prendergast, The Sentry Co-Founder called for investigations into companies operating in CAR’s sugar sector for any complicity in war crimes and crimes against humanity that they may have committed and be made accountable for them as their victims get compensated.

"The Central African Republic is besieged by predatory operators both foreign and domestic that profit from a state of permanent war. The international community should urgently address the financial motives that fuel mass atrocities in the Central African conflict and ensure that business advantages are not gained by funding criminal groups that commit grave abuses,” he said.

Expensive sugar

Not only are people forced to pay for the most expensive sugar in Central Africa, but the money they pay as sugar consumers has helped finance the very gangsters and deadly weapons that are terrorising and killing them, Nathalia Dukhan, Senior Investigator at The Sentry, said.

The watchdog calls on the International Criminal Court (ICC), the Central African Special Criminal Court (SCC) and France’s national antiterrorism prosecutor’s office to undertake an urgent review of the evidence presented in this report and open an investigation into the alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity committed by the UPC and their enablers, in particular SOMDIAA and SUCAF RCA, in the context of renewed violence in CAR starting in December 2012.

“The companies, holdings, and shareholders that constitute Pierre Castel’s business empire should immediately disclose to relevant authorities all materials in their possession connected to this report and undertake an open and transparent investigation into the alleged links between their businesses and armed conflict in CAR,” the report adds.

In its response, Castel Group announced it will launch an immediate investigation in response to the report.

However, The Sentry insists that the gravity of the allegations necessitates investigations by independent third parties including prosecutors in Paris and in The Hague.

“Other businesses including major financial institutions doing business with Castel Group and SUCA RCA should also conduct their own due diligence to assess whether those engagements are consistent with their standards and values," The Sentry's head of Investigations, J.R Mailey said.