The Abu Dhabi-based Privinvest group was unable to obtain permission to appeal against the decision of the High Court in London, which ruled in July that the company must pay billions of dollars to Mozambique.

High Court judge Robin Knowles concluded that Privinvest paid bribes to secure contracts for the supply of fishing boats, patrol vessels, radar stations and other goods to three fraudulent Mozambican state-owned companies run by the State Infiltration and Security Service (SISE).

The companies, Proindicus, Ematum and MAM, obtained loans of more than 2 billion dollars from the Russian banks Credit Suisse and VTB between 2013 and 2014.

The loans were guaranteed by sureties signed by Chang, which meant that the government became responsible for paying off these debts.

The trial in London analyzed whether these endorsements are void due to bribes paid to government officials and other serious irregularities in the process.

Mozambique won the case substantially, and the court ordered Privinvest to pay around 2 billion dollars to Mozambique.

Privinvest requested permission to appeal - but Judge Knowles refused the request. He said he did not believe an appeal would have any chance of success.

However, Privinvest didn't give up. It returned to court on December 10, but its hopes were dashed when the court merely reiterated its earlier decision. Knowles said: "After examining the materials and arguments presented in the application for permission to appeal, the court has concluded that none of the six grounds put forward by the Privinvest companies has a real prospect of success."

The hidden debt scandal dates back to 2013 and 2014, when the then Finance Minister, Manuel Chang, now in detention in the United States, approved state guarantees on loans from ProIndicus, Ematum and MAM to the banks Credit Suisse and VTB, without Parliament's consent.

Discovered in 2016, the debts were estimated at 170.6 billion meticais (2.7 billion dollars), according to figures presented by the Public Prosecutor's Office.

The trial was the culmination of almost four years of litigation in the British courts, to which the country appealed, alleging corruption, conspiracy to defraud by unlawful means and dishonest assistance to cancel debts and claim financial compensation worth millions of dollars.

Knowles analyzed each of these arguments and found them insufficient. In particular, he rejected the argument that Chang was just a "puppet" following orders from his superiors and, therefore,

Privinvest is also requesting a stay of execution of the sentence pending a possible appeal to a higher court, the Court of Appeal.