PARIS: French President Emmanuel Macron on Saturday urged his Iranian counterpart Ebrahim Raisi to “immediately end” Tehran’s support for Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, which involves supplying Moscow with attack drones, the Elysee said.
Macron in a telephone call underlined the serious “security and humanitarian consequences” of Iran’s drone deliveries “and urged Tehran to immediately end the support it thus gives to Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine,” said a statement.
The call came a day after White House national security spokesman John Kirby said Russia was receiving materials from Iran to build a drone factory on its territory that “could be fully operational early next year.”
The White House released a satellite image of the location of the prospective plant in the Alabuga special economic zone, some 900 kilometers (560 miles) east of Moscow.
“The Russia-Iran military partnership appears to be deepening,” Kirby said in a statement, citing US intelligence information.
The United States has said that Russia has received hundreds of Iranian attack drones to attack Kyiv and “terrorize” Ukrainians, a charge denied by Tehran.
According to US data, the drones are built in Iran, shipped across the Caspian Sea “and then used operationally by Russian forces against Ukraine,” Kirby said.
The White House said it would release a new government advisory to assist businesses and governments “to ensure they are not inadvertently contributing to Iran’s (drone) program.”
France’s Macron urges Iran to stop backing Russia in Ukraine
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France’s Macron urges Iran to stop backing Russia in Ukraine
German prosecutors seize assets in Lebanon bank fraud probe
- They allege that Salameh, acting with his brother Raja, “embezzled funds totalling more than $330 million”
- The money was laundered through a shell company in the British Virgin Islands
BERLIN: German prosecutors said Thursday they had seized assets worth around 35 million euros ($42 million) as part of a money-laundering probe targeting Lebanon’s former central bank governor Riad Salameh and four other people.
Salameh headed Lebanon’s central bank between 1993 and 2023 and has faced numerous accusations including embezzlement, money laundering and tax evasion in separate probes in Lebanon and abroad.
He has denied any wrongdoing.
Prosecutors in Munich said in a statement that “high-value commercial properties in Munich and Hamburg, as well as shares in a real estate company in Duesseldorf” had been seized as part of their investigation.
They allege that Salameh, acting with his brother Raja, “embezzled funds totalling more than $330 million to the detriment of the Lebanese central bank and thereby at the expense of the Lebanese state, in order to illegally enrich himself” between 2004 and 2015.
The funds originated from financial transactions between the Lebanese central bank and commercial banks in Lebanon.
The money was laundered through a shell company in the British Virgin Islands and used by Raja Salameh and three other co-accused for investments in Germany and elsewhere in Europe, prosecutors say.
A court in Munich will now decide whether the seized property can be permanently confiscated.
German prosecutors opened their investigation in 2021 and have been working with investigators from France and Luxembourg.
Salameh has been accused of being a key culprit in Lebanon’s economic crash, which the World Bank has called one of the worst in recent history, but he has defended his legacy and insisted he is a “scapegoat.”
He was arrested in Lebanon in 2024 and indicted in April 2025 for allegedly embezzling $44 million from the central bank.
In September he was freed after posting more than $14 million in bail and on condition of a one-year travel ban.
