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| Middle East |
| Kuwaiti paper: Yasser caught with his hand in the till |
| 2002-06-17 |
| On June 7, 2002, the Kuwaiti Al-Watan daily published the following report: "Yesterday, Al-Watan received documents from private sources in the Cairo branch of an Arab bank showing that Yasser Arafat had deposited in his name $5.1 million into a personal account. According to sources, this is theft of Arab aid funds allocated to the Palestinians through an arrangement between Arafat and his Cairo office head Ramzi Khouri." "The sources added that according to the documents, these funds were deposited in the personal accounts of President Arafat to cover some of the president's personal expenses, including the costs of his wife Suha and their daughter who live in Paris and Switzerland." "The sources added that nobody knows of this theft, with the exception of some of Arafat's closest cronies, including his Cairo office head Ramzi Khouri and Khaled Slam, originally from Iraq, whose real name is Muhammad Rashid and who is one of Arafat's top 'and most influential' advisors." "The sources added that some weeks ago Muhammad Rashid had bought, on Arafat's instructions, 14% of the shares of the Jordanian Cement Company for the [Palestine Commercial Services Company] with funds received by Arafat from the Arab Gulf states, 'to increase the profits of Arafat's investments abroad,' in light of the increase in cement prices following increased demand due to the reconstruction of what the Israeli forces destroyed in their recent incursion into the West Bank cities." "Al-Watan adds to this news item photos of the documents received from its Cairo sources regarding the deposit of U.S. $5.1 million by Arafat into his personal account in the Arab Bank in Cairo." Oh, hand me a tissue, please! It's only $5.1 mil, taken from the mouths of widows and orphans and the destitute... |
| Posted by:Fred Pruitt |