“Together with our law enforcement partners in the United States and around the globe, our commitment to disrupting and dismantling Hizbollah and other terrorist organisations is unwavering,” says Manhattan United States Attorney, Preet Bharara.
The statement above denotes the filing of a civil money laundering lawsuit against the Lebanese financial institutions linked with Hizbollah.
Document seen by this press says Hizbollah is a Lebanese terrorist organisation formed in approximately 1982 is responsible for some of the deadliest terrorist attacks against the United States in history.
As a result, the document says, pursuant to the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA), all assets in the United States in which Hizbollah has interest are blocked, and any transaction or dealing with such property or providing goods and services to Hizbollah is prohibited in the United States or by U.S. persons without an appropriate Licence.
It is further reported that in January 2011, U.S. Department of the treasury, Office of Foreign Assets Control tagged the Hassan Ayash Exchange Company as significant foreign narcotics Traffickers under the Foreign Narcotics Kingpin Designation Act (the Kingpin Act) related to their roles in the money-laundering activities of Ayman Joumaa, a Lebanese narcotics trafficker linked to Hizbollah.
Joumaa who also was tagged as a significant foreign narcotics trafficker was indicted in November, 2011 in the Eastern District of Virginia on charges of Conspiracy to distribute narcotics and money laundering related to drug trafficking by Mexican and Columbian drug cartels.
The US Attorney while opening his case, says the ways which terrorist organisations fund themselves and move their money is deviously creative and put into stark relief the nexus between narcotics trafficking and terrorism.
He also assured the world that the US puts a stranglehold on a major source of that funding by disrupting a vast and far-flung network that spanned three continents.
The US Attorney alleged that Lebanese terrorist organisation involved into a massive international scheme of narcotics deal.
The deal involves the Lebanese financial institutions including a bank and two exchange houses linked to Hizbollah used the United States financial system to launder narcotics trafficking and other criminal proceeds through West Africa and back into Lebanon.
As part of the scheme, the allegation says, funds were wired from Lebanon to the United States to buy used cars which were transported to West Africa.
Cash from the sale of narcotics, the allegation says, along with proceeds of narcotics trafficking were then funneled to Lebanon through Hizbollah-controlled money laundering channels.
Substantial portion of the cash were paid to Hizbollah which the U.S. Department of state designated as a terrorist organisation in 1997.
As alleged in the complaint, the Hizbollah-linked financial institutions involved in the scheme include the Lebanese Canadian Bank (LCB) and two Lebanese exchange houses-The Hassan Ayash Exchange Company and Ellisa Holding and their related subsidiaries and affiliates.
The United States Attorney thus seek the forfeiture or confiscation of LCB assets, along with assets approximately 30 U.S. car buyers and a U.S. shipping company and related entities that facilitated the scheme.
The allegation holds that the properties are proceeds of violations of the IEEPA with Executive Orders and U.S. Department of the Treasury regulations, and as property involved in and the proceeds of money laundering offences.
In February 2011, U.S. Department of the Treasury Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) identified LCB as a financial institution of primary money Laundering concern.
Consequently, U.S. financial institutions ended their relationships with LCB as it prevented the agency from sending money to the United States.
The finding was based on FinCEN’s determination that LCB was used by drug traffickers and money launderers around the world including at least one narco-trafficker who provided financial support to Hizbollah.
The United States seek civil money-laundering penalties totaling USD483,142,568 from the Narcotics and terrorist networks representing the sum of the funds they have laundered. LCB had permitted Hizbollah-related entities to conduct massive cash transactions, in some cases, as much as USD260,000 and 2000,000,000 Lebanese pounds per day without disclosing the source or purpose of the money.
Hassan Ayash Exchange was LCB’s main source of U.S. currency, and LCB allowed Ellissa companies to conduct large cash transactions through the bank without sufficient oversight or disclosures about the sources and purpose of the cash.
U.S. allegations against Lebanon also held that From January 2007 to early 20111, at least USD329M was transferred by wire from LCB, the Hassan Ayash Exchange Company, the Ellissa Exchange Company and other Lebanese financial institutions including Middle East and Africa Bank, the federal bank of Lebanon and BLOM Bank, to the United States for the purchase and shipment of used cars.
The car buyers in the United States, according to the allegations, had little or no property or assets other than the bank accounts used to receive the overseas wire transfers.
The cars, U.S. authorities say, were shipped to Cotonou, Benin where they were housed and sold from large car parks including one owned by the Ellissa Group, a subsidiary of Ellissa Holding.
A large chunk of the cash proceeds from the car sales was transported to Lebanon by a Hizbollah-controlled system of money couriers and currency brokers.
A Network of money couriers controlled by Oussama Salhab, an alleged Hizbollah operative living in Togo transported tens of millions of dollars and Euros from Benin to Lebanon through Togo and Ghana.
It is also alleged by the United States that Salhab and his relatives also own and control Cybamar Swiss GMBH, LCC, a transportation company based in Michigan that was frequently used to ship cars to West Africa as well as other entities involved in the scheme.
Cash transported from West Africa, U.S. authorities alleged was often received at the Beirut airport where Hizbollah security safeguarded its passage to its final destination.
This same used car, Hizbollah controlled money laundering infrastructure is used to conceal and funnel hundreds of millions of dollars in narcotics proceeds from West Africa back to Lebanon.
Joumaa’s drug trafficking organisation which operates in Lebanon, West Africa, Panama and Columbia launders as much as USD200M in proceeds per month through various channels including cash smuggling operations and Lebanese exchange houses.
Joumaa’s organisation uses Hizbollah Couriers to transport and launder narcotics proceeds, and pays fees to Hizbollah operatives to facilitate the laundering of narcotics proceeds.
Another drug trafficking organisation led by Maroun Saade is also involved in the transportation and distribution of large quantities of narcotics and West Africa.
It is alleged that Saade is a member of the Free Patriotic Movement, a Lebanese Christian Organisation closely allied with Hizbollah, and has provided extensive services to Hizbollah members engaged in narcotics trafficking and cash smuggling in West Africa.
On February 2011 Saade was charged in the Southern District of New York with participating in an international drug conspiracy in West Africa and conspiring to aid the Taliban.
Saade, U.S. authorities also alleges, is a close associate of Salhab who relied on Saade to pay bribes to release money couriers arrested for smuggling cash through West Africa.
In 2007 and 2008, the report says, approximately USD1.2 billion in declared U.S. currency was transported across the Togo/Ghana border on its way from Benin to the airport in Accra, where it is believed the cash could be further shipped.
These serious allegations have damaged US-Lebanon relations to date. The trump Presidency did little or nothing to normalize relations between US and Lebanon. Trump is now out of the White House, and Joe Biden is now in with slightly above a month to take full control of the White House.
The question is: what Strategies Joe Biden would adopt for new relations with Lebanon and the entire Arab world.