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BEIRUT/LONDON/MOSCOW (Reuters) - The company that bought the ammonium nitrate which exploded in Beirut last August had possible links to two Syrian businessmen under U.S. sanctions for ties to President Bashar al-Assad, according to a report by a Lebanese journalist and London company filings.
FILE PHOTO: A still image taken from a drone footage shows the damage two days after an explosion in Beirut s port area, Lebanon August 6, 2020. Reuters TV/via REUTERS
Savaro Ltd, the trading firm which procured the chemicals in 2013, shared a London address with companies linked to George Haswani and Imad Khoury, according to the report by documentary film-maker Firas Hatoum, which aired on Lebanon’s al-Jadeed TV station this week.
Enab Baladi
Syrian businessman and oil tycoon Bassel George Haswani has today survived an attempted assassination in Rif Dimashq, two days after his father’s name appeared in an investigation on those complicit in the 2020 Beirut Explosion.
On Haswani’s Facebook page, director Imad Jandali AlRifai wrote that Haswani was a target of an assassination attempt and that he was shot on the Rima road in Yabrud area.
Haswani survived and the damage was exclusively material, AlRifai added.
Bassel Haswani is the owner of the Damascus-based Masa Oil Company.
He claims reputation not only for being the son of an energy mogul but also for frequently posting photos with militants in areas across Syria.
In reviewing filings with Companies House, the UK’s companies registry,
Reuters found that Savaro and Hesco Engineering and Construction Company Ltd, a firm subject to US sanctions for its links to Haswani, both moved their corporate registers official company records to the same London address on June 25, 2011.
That address was also the registered office for IK Petroleum Industrial Company Ltd, in which Imad Khoury was a director, the filings show.
Dozens of companies can share listed addresses and such links do not necessarily prove company owners are connected. But it is rare for firms to move their registers, particularly to the same address on the same day, according to a
The company that bought the ammonium nitrate which exploded in Beirut last August had possible links to two Syrian businessmen under US sanctions for ties to President Bashar Assad.