French court upholds Assad uncle’s conviction over ill-gotten assets

By AFP 7 September 2022, 5:55 pm

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Rifaat Assad, an uncle of Syrian President Bashar Assad, speaks with the Associated Press on November 15, 2011, in Paris. (AP Photo/Michel Euler)

France’s top administrative court confirms the conviction of Rifaat Assad, uncle of Syrian President Bashar Assad, in an “ill-gotten gains” case over wealth estimated at 90 million euros (dollars).

Rifaat Assad, 85, is the younger brother of Bashar’s father, former Syrian dictator Hafez Assad, and himself held the office of vice president but fled the country in 1984 after a failed coup.

He had made a final appeal to France’s Court of Cassation after a lower court last year confirmed his four-year jail sentence for conspiracy to launder Syrian public funds between 1996 and 2016.