US prosecutors reveal how Lebanese man was part of a plot to trade cocaine for Syrian weapons in Nairobi
Antoine Kassis was extradited from Kenya in February following an Interpol arrest warrant requested by the United States over his involvement in narco-terrorism and money laundering.
A grand jury indictment delivered by a federal court in the Eastern District of Virginia has revealed the intricate details behind the arrest and extradition of a Lebanese national from Nairobi earlier this year.
Antoine Kassis was extradited from Kenya in February following an Interpol arrest warrant requested by the United States over his involvement in narco-terrorism and money laundering.
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Court documents indicate that Kassis was in Kenya to broker an audacious plan involving the shipment of hundreds of kilograms of cocaine, concealed in fruit containers, to the Port of Latakia in Syria in exchange for military-grade weapons sourced from the stockpiles of the deposed Syrian ruler Bashar al-Assad.
The case exposes a complex criminal network involving drug cartels, rebel groups, and rogue regimes operating across four continents.
According to the documents, Kassis negotiated the scheme on behalf of the deposed Syrian regime during a meeting in Kenya with arms inspectors from Colombia’s National Liberation Army (ELN). The deal involved importing a shipping container, ostensibly filled with fruit, from Colombia to Syria’s Latakia Port.
The ELN, Colombia's largest remaining guerrilla group, is a known cocaine producer and has been linked to kidnappings, bombings, and violent civilian attacks. The container was, in fact, to contain 500 kilograms of cocaine, prosecutors stated.
In exchange, weapons from Bashar al-Assad’s arsenal would be provided to one of Latin America’s most notorious criminal organisations, with millions of dollars laundered as part of the transaction.
“This plot was made public last week in an unsealed grand jury indictment in federal court in the Eastern District of Virginia, where one of its key players made a first appearance,” The New York Times reported.
Kassis, one of three men charged in connection with the plot, appeared in court on Friday in Virginia after his extradition from Kenya. The trio are accused of participating in a narco-terrorism conspiracy and of conspiring to provide material support to a foreign terrorist organisation—namely Colombia’s National Liberation Army.
The charges relate to events and transactions that allegedly occurred across Colombia, Ghana, Morocco, Lebanon, Syria, Kenya, the United States, and other countries between April last year and late February.
The case is considered significant due to the dangerous international connections it unveils and the concerns it raises about military weapons from the Bashar al-Assad regime falling into criminal hands following the dictator’s ousting in December.
According to the documents, Kassis was a Lebanese drug trafficker with high-level connections to members of the Bashar al-Assad regime, which has long been accused of turning Syria into a narco-state.
The indictment links Kassis to a global money laundering network based in Lebanon, whose members allegedly collaborated with the ELN, a group also reported to have worked with Mexico’s Sinaloa Cartel.
Court documents further reveal that in the spring of last year, Kassis met two alleged money launderers, Alirio Rafael Quintero and Wisam Nagib Kherfan. He is said to have struck a deal leveraging his Syrian contacts to secure military-grade weapons for the ELN in exchange for cocaine.
Under the agreement, Kassis would distribute the drugs in the Middle East, while Quintero and Kherfan would manage the payments and launder the proceeds.
Prosecutors also disclosed the extent of Bashar al-Assad’s criminal network, stating that despite his removal from power, he still had access to weapons previously supplied to his regime by foreign governments, including Russia and Iran.
Kenyan DCI officers apprehended Kassis at his hotel in February, acting on an Interpol notice issued by US authorities and a warrant from the federal court in Virginia.
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