LatinNews Daily - 27 January 2020

Argentina: On 20 January US Secretary of State Michael Pompeo highlighted Argentina’s efforts to “confront” Hezbollah – the Lebanese militant group designated as a terrorist organisation by the US. Speaking at the third Hemispheric Anti-Terrorism Ministerial Conference in Colombia’s capital Bogotá, Pompeo referred to Argentina’s designation of Hezbollah as a terrorist organisation in July 2019 and its subsequent freezing of financial assets belonging to 14 individuals connected to one of the organisation’s most notorious figures in the region, Assad Ahmad Barakat. Since Argentina’s new President Alberto Fernández was sworn in on 10 December 2019 these sanctions have remained in place, and this month Argentina’s financial intelligence unit (UIF) extended them by six months. At the conference Pompeo also highlighted that other countries in the region had similarly designated or plan to designate Hezbollah as a terrorist organisation, including Paraguay, Honduras, Guatemala, and Colombia. He also mentioned that Peru’s prosecution of alleged Hezbollah operative, Mohammed Hamdar, continues and noted Barakat’s arrest by Brazilian federal police (in 2018). Following his Colombia visit, Pompeo travelled to Costa Rica and Jamaica on a three-day whistle-stop tour of Latin America and the Caribbean.

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