Lebanon: Saudi national kidnapped shortly after arriving in Beirut

Aerial view of the city of Beirut (illustration image).

Getty Images - Holger Leue

Text by: RFI Follow

1 min

Lebanese justice opened an investigation on Monday into the kidnapping on Sunday of a Saudi citizen, trapped by a gang of criminals to buy a property in the Bekaa plain.

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With our correspondent in Beirut,

No news has filtered out of the Saudi national who went missing 24 hours after arriving in Beirut on Sunday.

The army and the security services, which have launched a vast operation to try to find him, remain silent.

The Saudi national, whose name has not been revealed, was allegedly lured to Lebanon by a gang on the pretext of selling him a property in the eastern Bekaa plain.

He was reportedly abducted on the way to the airport as soon as he arrived, but no ransom demand has been made at this stage. 

A judicial source told the press that the Saudi national could be detained west of the city of Baalbeck, in the district of Charawina.

The governor of the region, Bashir Khodr, however, said he had no information on the presence in Baalbeck of a Saudi missing.

The Charawina district has become a lawless zone since the crisis that hit Lebanon in 2019. Violent clashes regularly erupt between the army and gangs specializing in kidnapping and drug trafficking.

Last April, an Egyptian accountant was released by security forces after two weeks in captivity in Baalbeck. 

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• Lebanon

• Saudi Arabia