Does Italian ECA stifle Mozambique LNG atrocities?

(Barrons/AFP, Paris, 15 November 2024) French energy giant TotalEnergies, recipient of Italian (& French?) ECA funding, was aware of accusations of abuses committed by soldiers charged with protecting its gas site in Mozambique as early as 2021. "Complaints of extortion, disappearances and even violence leading to the deaths of two fishermen are recorded in quarterly social reports written by teams of Mozambique LNG," TotalEnergie's subsidiary in the country, according to Le Monde. The reports were sent to the Italian export credit agency SACE, from which an Italian NGO, ReCommon, and Le Monde obtained them under a right of access to information legislation. TotalEnergies used hired guards of the local affiliate of UK security firm G4S linked to a former liberation figure and ex-minister of security in the 1980s. ECA-Watch noted in 2016 that Korean, French, Italian and Chinese ECAs were set to play a key role in the financing of two LNG projects planned in the north of Mozambique despite widespread concerns about gross human rights violations by local authorities.