A Brussels court has ordered a Semlex corruption trial. Judges referred the Belgian biometrics firm and 13 other defendants to face criminal proceedings this week.
The case centres on a contract to produce biometric passports for the Democratic Republic of Congo. Reuters first reported the referral, which followed a decision by the Brussels Council Chamber on Monday.
Semlex and its co-defendants must now answer charges of corruption, money laundering and tax fraud. Judges, according to civil parties in the case, found sufficient grounds to send the matter forward.
The Semlex corruption trial follows a nine-year investigation, according to Transparency International and the International Federation for Human Rights.
Investigators traced bank transactions and examined hundreds of emails and electronic messages during that period. They also carried out letters rogatory in Congo and the United Arab Emirates.
Kabila led Congo for eighteen years. Felix Tshisekedi succeeded him as president in January 2019, following a disputed election.
Semlex produced the DRC’s biometric passports between 2015 and 2025. The deal nearly doubled the cost of each document to $185.
Of that fee, civil parties in the Semlex corruption trial allege, $60 was funnelled to LRPS Ltd, a Dubai-registered company. They say it is linked to a relative of former president Joseph Kabila.
Authorities have not conclusively tied LRPS to Kabila’s relative. None of the allegations against Semlex has been proven in court.
Civil parties, including 51 Congolese citizens who joined the criminal probe in 2020, allege the scheme diverted close to $60 million in total.
Congolese activist Fred Bauma, one of the claimants, said the Semlex corruption trial would finally answer questions that have lingered for years. He said Congolese citizens have a right to know where their money went.
Semlex has not commented on the referral. The company said in 2017 that it was the target of a smear campaign.
A lawyer who previously represented Semlex declined to comment on the latest development. No date has been set for the trial.
Belgian authorities have not said how many Semlex employees face charges alongside the company. Civil parties describe the referral as a potential landmark.
They say it could produce the first trial of a Belgian company for bribing foreign officials. This claim has not been independently confirmed.
The case lands amid scrutiny of Belgium’s record on prosecuting overseas corruption. According to the OECD’s Working Group on Bribery, Belgium has brought few such prosecutions despite ratifying the body’s anti-bribery convention decades ago.
Congo remains one of the world’s poorest countries by income, despite its vast mineral wealth. For its more than one hundred million people, the Semlex corruption trial has become a test of whether foreign firms can be held to account.
