A shipowner wanted over a 2020 blast at Beirut port that killed more than 220 people has been arrested in Bulgaria, officials said Tuesday.
The August 4, 2020 disaster was one of the world’s largest non-nuclear explosions, ravaging swathes of the Lebanese capital and injuring more than 6,500 people.
Authorities have said the blast was triggered by a fire in a warehouse where tonnes of ammonium nitrate fertiliser had been stored haphazardly for years after arriving by ship, despite repeated warnings to senior officials.
Beirut authorities identified Igor Grechushkin, a 48-year-old Russian-Cypriot citizen, as the owner of the Rhosus, the ship that transported the ammonium nitrate.
Interpol issued red notices for him and two others in 2021.
Grechushkin “has been placed in detention for a maximum duration of 40 days by a court decision on September 7, confirmed on appeal,” a Sofia city court spokeswoman told AFP.
The authorities requesting extradition have 40 days to send the necessary documents to effect such a move, according to Bulgarian law.
– Held at airport –
Grechushkin was held on an Interpol red notice at Sofia airport on September 5 upon his arrival from Paphos in Cyprus, a Bulgarian judicial source confirmed to AFP.
Wanted by the Lebanese judicial authorities, he is being sought for allegedly “introducing explosives into Lebanon, a terrorist act that resulted in the death of a large number of people, disabling machinery with the intent of sinking a ship”, the Bulgarian prosecutor’s office said in a statement.
Grechushkin was arrested during a routine check of passengers arriving from Paphos, according to border police.
“He offered no resistance. He repeatedly insisted on speaking to a lawyer and, after consulting one, he fully cooperated,” Zdravko Samuilov, head of the border police at Sofia Airport, told reporters Tuesday.
He informed the officers that he came to Bulgaria “for tourism”, Samuilov added.
Beirut is preparing to request the extradition of Grechushkin, a Lebanese judicial source told AFP.
Authorities rely “on Mr. Grechushkin’s statements and on the information he holds… to shed light on essential aspects of the investigation”, the source said.
The Rhosus, a Moldovan-flagged cargo ship sailing from Georgia and bound for Mozambique, is widely understood to have brought the fertiliser to Beirut in 2013.
The Lebanese source said investigators would seek to determine “whether the cargo that departed from Georgia was genuinely destined for Mozambique or if its true destination was Beirut, and whether the ship had previously transported other shipments of ammonium nitrate”.
– Long-stalled investigation –
After it arrived in Lebanon, the Rhosus faced technical problems and security officials said it was impounded after a Lebanese company filed a lawsuit against its owner.
Port authorities unloaded the ammonium nitrate and stored it in a run-down port warehouse with cracks in its walls, according to officials.
The ship later sank in Beirut port in 2018.
An investigation into the blast has been mired in legal and political wrangling.
Judge Tarek Bitar resumed his investigation into the blast this year as Lebanon’s balance of power shifted.
This followed a war between Israel and Hezbollah that weakened the Iran-backed militant group, which had spearheaded a campaign for Bitar’s resignation.
Those questioned in the investigation include former Lebanese Prime Minister Hassan Diab, as well as military and security officials.
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