The hearing before the Paris Court of Appeal on the validity of seizures of the real estate and banking assets in Europe of the governor of the central bank of Lebanon, Riad Salamé, has been postponed to May 23, AFP learned on Tuesday. from sources familiar with the matter.
Mr. Salamé, 72, is suspected of having acquired this heritage through a massive embezzlement of Lebanese public funds.
Heard in mid-March in Beirut by several European judges investigating him, including the French investigating judge Aude Buresi, he claimed his innocence.
At the end of March 2022, France, Germany and Luxembourg announced that they would freeze 120 million euros of Lebanese assets linked to the person who has led the "
BDL
" since 1993 and four people.
French seizures
His defense is demanding the restitution of more than a dozen different seizures made by France, the value of which amounts to tens of millions of euros: apartments in the 16th arrondissement of Paris or on the Champs-Élysées, in the United Kingdom, in Belgium, bank accounts... The French judicial investigation was opened in July 2021, in parallel with European or Lebanese investigations.
According to investigative documents of which AFP has knowledge, the embezzlement scheme in question is mainly based on a company registered in the Virgin Islands, created in 2001 by the firm Mossack Fonseca, implicated in the “Panama Papers
”
.
Forry Associates Ltd, whose economic beneficiary would be Raja Salamé, brother of the governor, was authorized by the Banque du Liban headed by Mr. Salamé to trade Lebanese Treasury bills and Eurobonds for a commission.
This commission would then have been transferred to Swiss bank accounts belonging to Raja Salamé, who would have returned "
more than 220 million dollars to several personal accounts in Lebanon
", some of which belong to Riad Salamé.
Read alsoLebanon: the IMF warns of a risk of “dislocation of the economy”
Complex financial arrangements
Mr. Salamé had indicated to the Lebanese justice system in August 2021 that he had received money from his brother in order to repay a debt of 15 million dollars dating back to the 1990s. At this stage, in France, he is not not formally implicated, unlike one of his relatives, Anna K..
This 46-year-old Ukrainian, indicted in June 2022, is suspected of having contributed to "
complex financial arrangements to conceal the origin of the funds embezzled by Riad Salamé to the detriment of the Banque du Liban (...) and the ultimate beneficial owner of the funds
”.
According to several sources, Judge Buresi would like to question Mr. Salamé in mid-May in France, but it is not certain that Lebanon will authorize him to take the plane.
