Glencore's mining penalty.

A British subsidiary of mining and trading group Glencore was ordered to pay a total penalty of 276.4 million pounds in a London court on Thursday for seven bribery offences concerning its oil operations in Africa. Judge Peter Fraser at Southwark Crown Court ordered Glencore Energy UK Limited to pay a 182.9 million pound fine, who also approved a 93.5 million pound confiscation order. The judge said that the offences to which Glencore had pleaded guilty represented «corporate corruption on a widespread scale, deploying very substantial sums of money in bribes». On Wednesday, Britain's Serious Fraud Office told the court that Glencore Energy UK Limited paid - or failed to prevent the payment of - millions of dollars in bribes to officials in the five African countries.

The UK subsidiary pleaded guilty in June to the seven bribery offences. Glencore, a Swiss-based multinational, said it expected to pay up to $1.5 billion with allegations of bribery and market manipulation in the United States, Brazil and Britain last May.

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