STOCKHOLM: Swedish telecom equipment maker Ericsson has said it will pay a $207 million fine for breaching a deal with US authorities by not disclosing an investigation relating to suspected bribes to the Islamic State group in Iraq.
The company entered “a guilty plea regarding previously deferred charges relating to conduct prior to 2017,” for not disclosing an internal 2019 investigation relating under a 2019 Deferred Prosecution Agreement (DPA), it said in a statement late Thursday.
“The entry of the plea agreement will bring the 2019 DPA to an end,” the company said of the 195 million euro fine.
The Swedish company had already announced in January that it had earmarked 2.3 billion kronor ($220 million) to cover potential fines over the issue, which would be booked in the fourth quarter of 2022.
It had already agreed in 2019 to pay $1 billion in penalties to US authorities to close corruption cases in Djibouti, China, Vietnam, Indonesia and Kuwait.
Ericsson said it had entered the deferred prosecution agreement “to resolve previously disclosed Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) violations relating to conduct in several countries between 2010 and 2016.”
The company said that since its deal the US Department of Justice (DOJ) had “not alledged or charged” Ericsson with any new criminal conduct, and said the new fine related only to a failure to disclose documents to the DOJ in a timely manner.
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“This resolution is a stark reminder of the historical misconduct that led to the DPA. We have learned from that and we are on an important journey to transform our culture,” Ericsson’s chief executive Borje Ekholm said in the statement.
The alleged Iraq bribes were revealed by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ), based on an internal Ericsson investigation from 2019 that was never made public.
Swedish prosecutors have also opened an inquiry into the alleged IS payments.
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