Lifting Lebanon with one arrest

The apprehension of a former central bank chief raises expectations for integrity and rule of law in a nation demanding accountability.

The Monitor's View

For months, Lebanon has been in the news mostly for the artillery fire across the border between the country’s militant group Hezbollah and Israel. On Tuesday, a different kind of headline caught global attention, bringing light to Lebanon’s dark circumstances.

Prosecutors arrested the Mediterranean country’s former chief central banker, Riad Salameh, for alleged embezzlement. The move led the Beirut-based newspaper L’Orient Today to ask whether it signaled “the end of impunity in Lebanon.”

Even asking the question is a milestone. Lebanon has been caught in a prolonged political and economic crisis orchestrated, the World Bank has noted, “by the country’s elite that has long captured the state and lived off its [economy].”

Yet when governments falter to such a degree, a single act of accountability can mark a turning point. “We have opened a new chapter, a very positive development,” Ali Noureddine, a Lebanese economist, told The Wall Street Journal.

The apprehension of Mr. Salameh is an example of a failed state trying to right itself. Since an economic collapse in 2019, the people of Lebanon have endured persistent shortages of water, electricity, internet access, and health care. Elections have been repeatedly postponed. More than 130 towns now have no local government. The country ranks near the bottom of global corruption indexes. Levels of public trust, a survey by Arab Barometer published in July found, are among the lowest in the Middle East.

A push for legal reform has offered a cautious counterpoint. Last spring, for example, officials in the justice ministry and Parliament joined forces with the United Nations, the European Union, and civil society organizations to strengthen Lebanon’s judicial institutions. A judiciary that is free, independent, and impartial, one member of Parliament noted at the time, is essential for rebuilding people’s trust in the State.

A former Merrill Lynch banker who ran the central bank until last year, Mr. Salameh faces indictments in the United States and at least seven European countries for allegedly running a ring of bankers accused of laundering and embezzling hundreds of millions of dollars. His arrest follows a tug-of-war among public officials, prosecutors, and judges over whether and how to hold him accountable. Skeptics worry his apprehension marks an attempt to avert greater international scrutiny of corruption in Lebanon.

But even the cautious reactions from civil society and fellow bankers show an expectation of integrity. “Any measure taken to expose the rampant corruption established by Riad Salameh in the country is welcome,” Tanal Sabah, president of Lebanese Swiss Bank, told L’Orient Today. “When the judiciary fulfills its duty and role with independence and courage, justice is served,” Ibrahim Kanaan, head of the parliamentary Budget and Finance Committee, wrote on X. The country’s caretaker justice minister, Henri Khoury, said, “The judiciary has spoken, and we respect this decision.”

Civil society organizations have called on citizens to a “solidarity sit-in with the judiciary” in front of the Beirut Justice Palace on Sept. 5. Drawn by a rare act of accountability, they may help embolden officials to further acts of honesty over impunity.