Raja Salameh is BDL chief Riad Salameh's younger brother. (Credit: Reuters / L'Orient Today)
BEIRUT — Raja Salameh, the brother of Banque du Liban governor Riad Salameh, is in state custody, having been arrested Thursday on a warrant issued by Mount Lebanon Public Prosecutor Ghada Aoun, a judicial source has confirmed to L'Orient Today.
Here's what we know:
• Raja Salameh was arrested following his interrogation at a court house east of Beirut, Judge Aoun told Reuters.
• Reuters cited a judicial source separately saying that Aoun had charged Raja Salameh with "complicity in illicit enrichment" that also involved his brother Riad Salameh. The news agency added that Riad Salameh has not been charged with a crime, but cited its source as confirming that Raja Salameh had been detained at the Baabda courthouse and remained in custody.
• In 2020, Swiss authorities launched a probe into BDL’s payment of more than $330 million in brokerage fees to Forry Associates Ltd between 2002 and 2014. Registered in the Virgin Islands in 2001, Forry Associates Ltd is owned by Raja Salameh, the governor’s younger brother.
• Around $258 million out of the total $330 million were transferred to Swiss accounts allegedly belonging to Raja, of which $207 million went into his accounts in five banks in Lebanon.
• In Lebanon, Judge Ghada Aoun opened an investigation into Riad Salemeh on suspicion of fraud in the period leading up to Lebanon’s 2019 financial collapse. The BDL chief has repeatedly denied any wrongdoing and has tried to dismiss Aoun from cases, saying she is politically motivated and biased.
• President Michel Aoun has been accused of directing Mount Lebanon Public Prosecutor Judge Ghada Aoun to issue a subpoena against central bank Governor Riad Salameh, although his office had denied such claims calling them “lies.”
• At the end of February, Reuters indicated that it had gained access to contractual documents revealing that BDL had charged commissions to the country's commercial banks for more than 10 years when they bought government bonds but did not disclose that the large part of the proceeds of these commissions was paid to Forry Associates Ltd.