Alstom UK fined £15 million for Tunis metro contract bribe

The UK arm of French rail firm Alstom was on Monday fined £15 million ($20 million, 17.5 million euros) for bribery in relation to a tram contract in Tunisia, Britain's Serious Fraud Office said.

Alstom Network UK Ltd was convicted of conspiracy to corrupt last year for paying an intermediary 2.4 million euros to win an 80-million-euro contract with Transtu, which runs the Tunis Metro, between 2003 and 2006.

Instead of being "a legitimate contract for services", the intermediary - Nevco - was in fact "a conduit for bribes", the SFO said in a statement. The prosecution said Nevco was run by the brother-in-law of Tunisia's late president Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, who was ousted from power during the so-called "Arab Spring" of 2011.