Riad Salameh banned from leaving Lebanon after Interpol notice
Lebanon’s central bank governor Riad Salameh yesterday appeared in front of a judge in Beirut as part of an international corruption investigation.
Imad Kabalan, the attorney general at the Court of Cassation, questioned Mr Salameh after Interpol last week issued a Red Notice to locate him.
Mr Salameh was told to surrender his French and Lebanese passports to the judiciary, AFP reported.
He is banned from leaving Lebanon but remains governor. The Interpol notice came in response to a request from the French judiciary.
That issued an arrest warrant for Mr Salameh last week after he failed to appear at a hearing in Paris to answer to allegations of embezzlement of more than $330 million from the central bank.
He was then classified as a fugitive.
Lebanon is not legally compelled to extradite Mr Salameh, and the country has a long-standing policy of not expelling its citizens.
“But the judge could have decided on Mr Salameh’s arrest in Lebanon, place him under house arrest or filed formal accusations,” said Karim Daher, a lawyer for the UN’s High Level Panel on International Financial Accountability, Transparency and Integrity.
“This might have sent a positive signal to the European judiciary,” he said, stressing that the proceedings are “still in the investigative phase”.
A judicial action from Lebanon could also have had a decisive effect on Mr Salameh’s tenure as Governor.
The government shifted the responsibility for his dismissal to the judiciary, with the cabinet saying it needed formal accusations to be issued in Lebanon,
despite legal opinion that suggested it could dismiss Mr Salameh based on the code of money and credit.
AFP said the Lebanese judge asked the French judiciary for access to the entire file related to the case before making any decision to “determine whether the Lebanese judiciary will prosecute him for the crimes he is accused of in France”.
Observers said this might lead to a delay in the legal proceedings in Lebanon and push back any decision regarding his dismissal until Mr Salameh’s mandate expires at the end of July. Calls demanding that he step down are getting louder, but the matter is sensitive because Mr Salameh has long enjoyed strong political support since assuming his mandate in 1993.
He denies any wrongdoing, and his spokesman said no official communique was released after yesterday’s hearing.
He is suspected of having laundered misappropriated funds with the help of his brother Raja in Europe, where he and his entourage own properties valued in the millions.
On Tuesday, Germany’s public prosecutor informed the Lebanese judiciary of another international arrest warrant for Riad Salameh.