The French group Thalès raided in three countries on suspicion of corruption, criminal conspiracy and money laundering

The French group Thales was raided this week in France, the Netherlands and Spain, a judicial source told France Inter, confirming information from BFMTV. The French electronics group, specializing in aerospace, defense, security and land transportation, is at the heart of two investigations opened in Paris for corruption of foreign public officials, criminal association and money laundering.

These searches therefore take place as part of two investigations, the first of which was opened eight years ago. It concerns the sale of submarines and the construction of a naval base in Brazil. The second, opened last year, targets operations for the sale of civil and military equipment abroad.

The searches were carried out by 65 investigators, 12 magistrates from the national financial prosecutor’s office and simultaneously in the three countries, France, the Netherlands and Spain, in conjunction with their judicial authority and the European judicial coordination agency Eurojust.

Since 2010, the French group has also been the target of a third investigation, this time concerning the sale of submarines to Malaysia in 2002. In this context, the National Financial Prosecutor’s Office requested at the beginning of June that three former directors of the Thales group be sent to criminal court for corruption offences.