In a highly embarrassing diplomatic incident, Lebanese Finance Minister Fuad Siniora was detained in a cell for over two hours at Dulles Airport by US immigration officials upon his entry into the country on Thursday, despite having been issued a visa recently, Emerging Markets has learned.
The minister was taken by surprise by airport officials, having expected to sail through immigration, as procedures were followed to ensure his smooth arrival into the country, according to a well-placed source. But instead he was met with a blunt refusal – and a private detention cell.
“Perhaps they went a bit far,” says the source, referring to immigration officials, “but they were doing their job.”
Siniora, a former Citibank executive, was banned last year from entering the country because he made a $600 donation to an Islamic charity accused by Washington of backing terrorism. But the minister had been granted a special waiver in April, and had then received the go-ahead to enter the country. The source suggests the Lebanese embassy in Washington failed to file the appropriate papers.
Nevertheless, the incident will heighten fears among travellers to and from the US – including official government delegations, as well as World Bank and IMF staff – of excessive and humiliating treatment at the hands of US immigration in the wake of heightened anxiety over terrorism. Last week, an Eritrean delegation was detained while attempting to enter the US to attend the UN General Assembly in New York.
Siniora's detention occurred the day before his former colleague, Marwan Hamade, was badly wounded in an assassination attempt in Beirut, which killed Hamade's driver and injured his bodyguard. Hamade was set to attend the IMF annual meetings until his resignation as economy minister last month over a dispute concerning Syria's influence in Lebanese affairs. After the resignation, Siniora assumed Hamade's portfolio.
The assassination attempt recalls the dark days of Lebanon's civil war and has sent shivers through the region, where it is seen as an attempt by Syrian dissidents to test the resolve of a number of groups, including the US, to act on the question of Syrian troops on Lebanese soil.
UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan pressed Syria last Friday to withdraw its forces from Lebanon and criticized Lebanon's Syrian-backed president, Emile Lahoud, for seeking to extend his term beyond the constitutional limit of six years. In a related development, Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri will resign today.