Report 42 – Part II of Ian Lundin’s testimony
During the second week of Ian Lundin’s testimony, the prosecution’s strategy focused on asking him about various security reports, protocols, and letters that showed a connection between Lundin Oil’s activity in Block 5A and the conflicts that erupted in the region soon after the company’s arrival. In their questioning, the prosecution referred to many incidents and issues that they presented in their opening presentation of facts and which are described in our earlier reports.
This week saw prosecutors Henrik Attorps and Karolina Wieslander sharing the role of lead questioner. For his part, Ian Lundin patiently replied to their questions with occasional interruptions from his defence attorney, Torgny Wetterberg, who sat rather impatiently at his side throughout the hearings.
Beginning of the week
The second week of Ian Lundin’s testimony started on Tuesday 17 December 2024. It was a dark and cold morning in Stockholm and there were noticeably fewer spectators in the back rows of Courtroom 34 compared to the previous week. Prosecutor Henrik Attorps began by displaying an email from the local management of Lundin Oil in Sudan addressed to the Geneva office, seeking approval from Geneva for the 2002 work program for the operations in Sudan. Henrik Attorps asked Ian Lundin who had the power to give such an approval, to which Lundin replied that it changed all the time. The 2003 work program for Sudan was also sent to Geneva for approval, but he stated that he did not know who in Geneva was responsible for approvals at that time either. He also added that by that time, he was no longer CEO of the company, so he did not know if the Geneva office had undergone any reorganization after he became chair of the board.
This line of questioning was a continuation of the prosecution’s attempt from last week to establish a hierarchy within the company by asking Lundin about who reported to whom. However, as with the previous week, their efforts continued to go unrewarded as Lundin rarely gave a straight answer, instead describing the company as having a flat structure without a clear hierarchy.
The prosecutors had generally been following a chronological timeline in their questioning, and by this point in the hearing, they had addressed the signing of the EPSA agreement and moved on to the company’s operations in 1997, including two Joint Management Committee (JMC) meetings in May and November of 1997. The JMC was made up of representatives from Lundin Oil and the other members of the IPC consortium, along with representatives from OEPA, a department in the ministry of energy and mining that managed foreign companies in Sudan. It was through JMC meetings and OEPA that most of the communications were carried out between Lundin Oil and the Sudanese government during the years that the company was active in Sudan.
Ian Lundin stated that he knew about these meetings and that he would generally receive some kind of report about what was discussed in them. However, he did not recall these two particular meetings in 1997, though, nor many of the other meetings. He did not know if the security situation in the country was discussed at all. For its part, the prosecution did not have any minutes or further details from the meetings apart from the handouts, which only listed the general agenda points. As such, the court was left still not knowing what kind of discussions occurred in those meetings.
Security in Block 5A
By February of 1998, the consortium had begun seismic operations in Block 5A. Asked what kind of operations these were and what results they yielded, Lundin answered that he was never very involved in the technical aspects of this operation. Lundin described the consortium’s operations in Sudan as smooth until 24 February 1998 when they had to briefly suspend their activities due to fighting in the area between militia groups – specifically, the groups led by Paulino Matiep and Tito Biel. An internal security report from that time period noted: “Paulino is going to be a problem for the future.”
Per the terms of the EPSA, security for IPC operations in Block 5A was to be managed by the Sudanese government. The Khartoum Peace Agreement (KPA) further stipulated that the rebel alliance South Sudan Defence Forces (SSDF), led by Riek Machar, would assume responsibility for security in Block 5A and other areas in the south without the government’s involvement. For that reason, SSDF was initially assigned to provide security for the consortium’s activities in Block 5A. At the time, Tito Biel was a commander of one of the rebel groups within the SSDF.
Health, Security and Environment (HSE) was the company’s own security expertise, which came under the local management structure and was mostly made up of security consultants with a military background. Within the management of the consortium, HSE also worked with the state security force Petroleum Security (PetSec). By assigning representatives from PetSec and OEPA to supervise the security in Block 5A in collaboration with HSE, the government maintained their presence in the area even though this could have been seen as a violation of the KPA by Tito Biel and the SSDF.
Incident at the highland camp in June 1998
In June 1998, the highland camp that was the base of the consortium’s operations in Block 5A was attacked. There was no personnel present on site at the time and only equipment was damaged. Asked about this, Ian Lundin stated that he had no recollection of hearing about this incident. However, he also objected to the description of the incident as an “attack” as he believed it could also have started as a conflict between two other parties that accidentally affected the camp. In particular, he suggested that it could have been a fight between Tito Biel and Paulino Matiep, whose names had already been mentioned several times throughout the hearing.
Shortly after this incident, Alan Packwood, one of Lundin Oil’s HSE staff, wrote a security report directed to Keith Hill and Alexandre Schneiter. The prosecution pointed out that in the report, Packwood described the fighting between Tito Biel and Paulino Matiep as the most problematic issue related to the security of the operations at the time, and noted that some cars had been attacked by troops under Matiep’s control. The report went even further to say that the conflict between the two was connected to the parties wanting influence over the oil companies’ activities in Block 5A. Asked by the prosecution about this report, Ian Lundin’s reply was that the report was the opinion of someone on the ground and not necessarily the opinion of the company. It was also written very early during the Sudan project, when there was not yet any secure prospect of producing oil.
During this part of the hearing, Ian’s defence attorney Torgny Wetterberg interrupted several times to point out specific words or phrases that he felt were not properly captured in the translation between Swedish and English.
In 1998, GNPOC, a company operating in the neighboring Block 4, released a report that described how the Sudanese government protected their oil interests in the south by what the report described as a “divide and rule strategy.” This involved the government exploiting local rivalries by supporting different militia leaders. Asked about this, Ian Lundin objected to this framing, stating that the theory presented in the report was not in line with his own views. In his view, since Riek Machar was a part of the Sudanese government and the KPA was still in force, the company could rely on the government and operate in a peaceful environment. He further described the report’s reasoning as “a conspiracy theory that doesn’t hold up in daylight.”
New security solution
The incident at the highland camp was discussed at a subsequent JMC meeting in December 1998. According to Lundin, the meeting participants agreed that what he referred to as “the local police force” – meaning the SSDF – was no longer able to provide sufficient security for the company’s operations in Block 5A. Instead, an agreement was reached between the consortium, OEPA, and PetSec to make the regular Sudanese army the “primary guard force” and to strengthen PetSec’s involvement in security in the area. In practice, this resulted in a mixed guard force that included both SSDF and military troops guarding the consortium’s operations in Block 5A.
Tuesday’s hearing concluded with a discussion on the discovery of oil at the Thar Jath drilling site in the spring of 1999. The prosecution presented an article from a Swedish financial newspaper in which Lundin’s father, Adolf Lundin, had declared that Lundin Oil had made a very big finding of oil in southern Sudan, but that because of the rainy season they were having trouble going further with their discovery.
The attack on Thar Jath
Wednesday’s hearing began on a serious note as Ian Lundin was asked by the prosecution to describe his recollection of an incident in which one of the company’s drilling rigs was attacked. Lundin described how on 2 May 1999 he was travelling in Malaysia when he received a phone call informing him that there had been a brutal attack on the company’s drilling rig in Thar Jath. The initial information received was that two guards had been shot dead and a third was in critical condition, but a short time later, Lundin learned that the injured guard had succumbed to his injuries on the way to the hospital in Khartoum. Ian Lundin’s immediate concern was the safety of the staff, but by the time he was informed, all staff had already been evacuated to a safe location. He later found out that the three guards killed were part of the mixed guard force and these three in particular were from PetSec. Lundin told the court that he had never received a real explanation as to why the drilling rig was attacked. One possible explanation he could think of was that given the nature of the mixed guard force, some of them might have had their own agenda and loyalties. He described the militias as unreliable and always fighting internally, so it was possible that there were rivalries either between two groups or within the same group. After the attack, all operations in Block 5A were immediately suspended.
The prosecution then presented a post incident report from HSE regarding the attack, which stated that the military did enter the block shortly after the attack, but that Paulino Matiep and his militia arrived first. The report suggested that this was possibly due to a misunderstanding between Paulino’s forces to excuse the entering of the block since otherwise it would be a breach of the KPA.
The report also made several other controversial statements. For instance, it claimed that the discovery of oil in Thar Jath “may have been the deciding factor” in the military’s decision to enter the block. The report stated that the military had been preparing for this deployment for several weeks beforehand, but it was unlikely that the army would be deployed before the discovery at Thar Jath became known. This also caused tensions to rise within Block 5A as the SSDF became concerned that a military deployment was imminent. Towards the end of the report, the author also noted that HSE’s efforts to gather information were hindered by government restrictions.
Presented with this report in court, Ian Lundin clearly did not believe that its conclusions matched his understanding of the situation in Block 5A at the time. He contested the report’s claims that Matiep entered the Block before the military and that the deployment of the military had anything to do with the finding of oil. According to him, the military mobilized to protect the drilling rig after the attack. His understanding was always that the army was a neutral force, and he did not believe that the army entering the Block could have been the cause of any fighting. He argued that the military was forced to enter the area to calm the factional fighting and claimed that many reports stated that the government was not keen on entering the Block.
At this point Lundin’s defence attorney Torgny Wetterberg interrupted the hearing and complained that the prosecution had incorrectly described the text in the report, which was clear for everyone in the courtroom to read on the multiple projector screens where the report was currently being displayed. The prosecution objected to this and insisted they had read the text word for word.
Ian Lundin explained that the company’s local management got their information from HSE. The company’s understanding was always that the deployment of the military would have a stabilizing effect. He could not remember exactly who had told him this, but if he had to guess it was maybe Dr. Alan Bagi, Keith Hill, or Tim Sarney. The fact that the only guards killed in the attack were from PetSec made it clear that the attack targeted those representing the Sudanese government. Lundin explained that it was possible the person who wrote the report did not have the whole picture. Regarding the government’s restrictions on gathering information, he responded that while it is normal for the government to have some things they did not want to share, the HSE personnel were consultants, and they had their own views and theories. Ian explained that he was sure the information they had was completely adequate.
Lastly, the prosecution brought attention to the report noting that the company had made a request to the government that from then on, the guard force in Block 5A would be completely made up of Sudanese military soldiers.
Incident with the press
After lunch on 18December, the fourth day of Ian Lundin’s hearing, defence attorney Torgny Wetterberg informed the court that he along with the defendant had just experienced a very uncomfortable incident outside the courthouse. He stated that they had been approached by some journalists in a very aggressive and physical manner, to the point that they felt it was a physical confrontation. Judge Zander promised that he would report the incident to the court security.
Sudan Weekly report
Throughout its examination of Ian Lundin, the prosecution has asked many questions about how information was shared within the company since an important component of the indictment is the extent of Ian Lundin and Alexandre Schneiter’s knowledge of the company’s activities in Sudan at the time. The prosecution asked Ian Lundin about the meaning of certain addresses and initials on one of the many weekly reports sent from the local management in Sudan to the company’s headquarters in Geneva. This particular report was addressed to “Lundin Geneva” which according to Lundin did have any particular meaning. The prosecution then asked about what they saw as four sets of handwritten initials on the paper, one of them being A.S. When asked if the letters “AS” on the paper signified that Alexandre Schneiter had read this report, Lundin replied that he did not know what the letters meant, and he was not even sure that describing them as initials was correct.
Moving on to the contents of the Sudan Weekly Report from 18 May 1999, prosecutor Karolina Wieslander asked Ian Lundin if he knew that one of the criteria for IPC’s continued deployment in the block was that the guard force should made up of only Sudanese military soldiers and that it had not yet been fulfilled. Lundin answered that he had no recollection of this, adding that to his knowledge, the only condition the company had imposed was that they needed a peaceful environment to be able to work. The report mentioned another condition – the establishment of a 50-kilometer radius of full military control around the rig site. To this, Lundin commented that it may be easy to look back and be critical, but the fact was that three people had been murdered and one could not be judgmental about what the company did at the time to ensure everyone’s safety. When the prosecution asked what it meant to have full military control of a 50-kilometer radius, he said that he could not answer that question since he did not have any military knowledge.
Helicopter incident in June 1999
Asked if he recalled a June 1999 incident in which one of the company helicopters was fired at and the pilot hit in the leg, Lundin answered that yes, he remembered the incident and that in his view it had been a random attack. This, however, was not the position expressed in the post incident report displayed by the prosecution, which described it as a targeted attack by the SSDF on the helicopter because of the helicopter’s previous military connections. Just a couple of days after the helicopter attack, the protocol from a meeting between the IPC consortium partners reflected a promise from the Sudanese government that in the future, adequate security would be provided by the Sudanese regular army. When asked to comment on this, Lundin recalled that the situation changed quickly after the military came into the area and that they had a stabilizing effect. According to the prosecution, the deployment of the army along with Matiep’s militia at this time was the start of a military offensive that continued until October 1999. Lundin, however, disagreed with the prosecution that there was any military offensive at this time.
Future plans for the company in Block 5A
After the last coffee break of the day, prosecutors Henrik Attorps and Karolina Wieslander once again switched places and Attorps took over the questioning. He first showed a map of the company’s planned seismic activity for the year 2000. The prosecution claimed that much of this activity was supposed to take place in the Jikany area, an area within Block 5A where the SSDF had a strong presence, which made it hostile towards the Sudanese military. The implication of this was that the company’s plans in Block 5A might have exacerbated the conflicts in the area. The reports of hostilities in the Jikany area continued during the summer of 1999.
Lundin recalled that it was during the summer of 1999 that he first heard about the plans for constructing an all-weather road to access the rig sites. According to his testimony, the planning at this stage was handled mostly by the local management, probably by Keith Hill who was the company’s project coordinator for Sudan at the time.
The prosecution then took up a letter written by Lundin’s father, Adolf Lundin, addressed to a former Sudanese ambassador in Sweden. The letter mentioned an “access road” – possibly a reference to the plans for the all-weather road. Adolf Lundin also expressed a wish to meet with Omar Al-Bashir, Sudan’s then-president, and discuss the company’s plans for 2000. He referred to Block 5B, the area adjacent to Block 5A, as being reserved for Lundin Oil in case they wanted to expand their operations in Sudan in the future. Ian Lundin and his defence argued that there was no evidence that this letter had ever been sent. Rather, they claimed, this was only a draft and it might not even have been written by Adolf Lundin himself. Ian Lundin stated that he did not recall whether his father ever met President Bashir. When the prosecution presented a report of Adolf Lundin and Omar Al-Bashir from 17 August 1999, Lundin denied any connection between the letter and the meeting.
The fifth day of the hearing with Ian Lundin
Thursday 19December was the last day of hearings before Christmas. To celebrate the season, one of the English interpreters wore a green shirt with Christmas tree decorations on it, which lightened the mood just a little bit.
Prosecutor Henrik Attorps started the day the day by asking Ian Lundin what he recalled about the first time Lundin Oil’s operations in Sudan were criticized on Swedish TV. This occurred during an interview with Magnus Nordin, one of the company’s spokespeople in Sweden, on a TV show called “Åtta dagar.” Lundin stated that he could not remember this at all. Attorps then reminded him that in the interview, Nordin had stated that reports about the Sudanese government committing war crimes were exaggerated. Lundin did not recall who within the company Magnus Nordin might have spoken with before the interview, but he admitted that it could have been himself, his father, or somebody else.
The UN report that made Lundin Oil react
Attorps then displayed a UN report from 1999, which may have been the report referenced in the interview. In the report it was claimed that 150 000 civilians had been displaced in western Upper Nile, the area in which Block 5A was situated. Specifically, it said that three to four thousand people had been displaced from Block 5A to the south. The report described the displacement as a consequence of fighting between Riek Machar and Peter Gadet. It also mentioned that Riek Machar did not consider the KPA to be valid any longer due to the military entering the area after the attack on Thar Jath. Here, Torgny Wetterberg interrupted the prosecution, stating that the prosecution’s summary of the report was incorrect. Judge Zander responded, seemingly annoyed, that the prosecution was allowed to summarize it.
Ian Lundin recalled seeing this report at the time and said that the allegations it made were a cause for concern. Wanting to understand the effects this report could have on the company, he hired a consultant, Christine Batruch, as an advisor to the company. Ian added that the KPA’s validity was very important to the company as it was a prerequisite for them to be able to continue working in the area.
Attorps continued asking about the report, including about the correlation shown between oil prospecting and mass displacement and other violations perpetrated against the civilian population. However, before Ian Lundin had the chance to respond, Judge Zander suddenly interrupted, stating that the panel of judges was no longer complete as one of lay judges had unexpectedly become sick and left the courtroom. This brought the day’s proceedings to a halt. Judge Zander announced that the next court date would be 14 January 2025.
Next report
Our next report will cover the rest of the prosecution’s examination of Ian Lundin.
