BEIRUT, April 27 (Reuters) – European investigators in Beirut questioned an assistant to Lebanon’s central financial institution governor on Thursday as a part of a probe into whether or not the governor embezzled and laundered lots of of hundreds of thousands of {dollars} in public funds, native media and a judicial supply stated.
Governor Riad Salameh is being investigated in Lebanon and in at the very least 5 European international locations over allegedly taking greater than $300 million from the central financial institution collectively along with his brother over greater than a decade.
A schedule for the European investigators seen by Reuters confirmed Marianne Houayek, 42 and a longtime assistant to the governor, was to be questioned as a suspect within the case. Others had been set to be questioned as witnesses.
A lawyer for Houayek didn’t instantly reply to a request for touch upon Thursday and neither made public feedback concerning the case.
The Salameh brothers have each denied wrongdoing. Riad Salameh says he’s being made a scapegoat for Lebanon’s monetary disaster that erupted in 2019.
A French court docket doc seen by Reuters says as much as $5 million euros from the central financial institution in the end went to Houayek by way of accounts in Switzerland and Luxembourg.
Houayek can also be talked about in a 2021 Swiss request for authorized help from Lebanese authorities, wherein Swiss authorities allege she was the beneficiary of funds that had been diverted from the central financial institution to the detriment of the Lebanese state.
A senior judicial supply advised Reuters that European investigators requested Houayek concerning the transfers, which she stated had been funds she inherited from her father that Salameh had helped her switch exterior Lebanon.
The senior judicial supply stated Houayek denied realizing the governor’s brother Raja Salameh or having heard of Forry Associates, the corporate that European prosecutors suspect Riad and Raja used to divert funds from the central financial institution within the type of commissions.
The supply added that she was requested about Marwan Kheireddine, a Lebanese banker whom prosecutors suspect solid financial institution paperwork to assist Raja and Riad disguise illicit sources of wealth.
The investigators had been set to query Raja on Tuesday and Wednesday, however he didn’t attend and his lawyer stated he can be unavailable for one week as a consequence of well being causes.
The governor, his brother and Houayek have been charged with monetary crimes in two separate instances in Lebanon however haven’t but been formally and publicly charged within the investigating European international locations.
On Friday, European investigators are set to query caretaker finance minister Youssef el-Khalil, who nonetheless serves because the central financial institution’s head of monetary operations, in addition to different high officers of the financial institution subsequent week.
Reporting by Maya Gebeily; Modifying by Hugh Lawson
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