Guy Elliott steps down from Shell board after Rio Tinto fraud charge

The Hague-based LNG giant Shell said Wednesday that Guy Elliott has stood down as a non-executive director of the company after US regulators charged his former company Rio Tinto with fraud for not coming clean about a coal deal in Africa.

In a complaint filed on Tuesday, the Securities and Exchange Commission charged mining company Rio Tinto and its former chief executive Tom Albanese and ex-finance director Guy Elliott with fraud for inflating the value of coal assets acquired for $3.7 billion and sold a few years later for $50 million.

The SEC’s complaint, which was filed in federal court in Manhattan, alleges that Rio Tinto and the two executives failed to follow accounting standards and company policies to accurately value and record its assets.

Rio Tinto intends to “vigorously defend itself against these allegations,” the company said in a statement on the SEC charges.

“We fully respect and appreciate Guy’s decision which is related to his involvement in legal proceedings regarding his former employment at Rio Tinto,”  Shell chair, Charles Holliday said in a statement following Elliott’s decision to step down.

“We will miss his insightful counsel and leadership and would like to thank him for his seven years of valuable contribution to the Shell board. We sincerely hope he satisfactorily resolves those proceedings and, that in that event, he would like to be considered for rejoining the board,” Holliday said.

LNG World News Staff