Syrian government freezes assets of Assad cousin
The move to seize the assets of the businessman is the latest in a dispute that began to heat up late last year.
The Syrian government ordered the assets of President Bashar al-Assad’s cousin, Rami Makhlouf, to be frozen in the latest episode of the regime’s attempt to isolate the business magnate.
A Syrian Finance Ministry document posted online ordered a “precautionary hold” on Makhlouf’s assets, as well as those of his immediate family.
The document justified the seizure as a “guarantee of repayment” of taxes allegedly owed by Syria’s largest telecommunications company, Syriatel, which Makhlouf owns.
Makhlouf went public with the dispute over the past few weeks in a series of videos posted online, refusing to step down as head of Syriatel and appealing to Assad directly. Makhlouf said in his latest video Sunday that some of Syriatel’s employees had been arrested and he was unable to contact them.
