A welcome gift for Egyptian President Sissi on an official visit from Monday in France. Owned by the Egyptian state, the building that houses its cultural center, located near the Luxembourg Gardens in Paris, was placed under judicial mortgage on November 30. Egypt was ordered by an arbitral tribunal to pay 117 million dollars to an industrialist of Egyptian origin. The businessman went to French courts to enforce the sanction, because Egypt is dragging its feet.
Abderraouf Baghat’s time is indeed running out. At 80, he is almost at the end of his victorious fight. He was imprisoned in Egypt during the Mubarak era and sentenced to 15 years of forced labor. He will be released after three years. The son of the raïs coveted his project of mining iron ore in Aswan.
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The Paris judicial tribunal recognizes the sentence
Multiplying the appeals, the old man obtained the annulment of his criminal “conviction”. Then he sought to recover his property and his investments. This is how he went to international justice and won his case. The president of the Paris judicial tribunal recognized the international award on June 11, 2020. It was following this decision that the businessman obtained, on November 30, the publication of the judicial mortgages on real estate belonging to to Egypt.
Abderraouf Bahgat, now Finnish, was born in 1940 in Cairo. He made his fortune in Finland in the lumber industry. In 1997, he responded to the invitation of the Egyptian government, which was looking for investors to develop the iron mining activity in the Aswan region, with the aim of promoting the development of this poor region.
The businessman has today taken legal action in all countries where there are property of Egypt. According to master Raphaël Kaminsky, his lawyer: “My client was in contact with the Egyptian government to try to find a solution. There has not been any more since the month of October ”The advice of the businessman had obtained the seizure of a building in the Netherlands. But The Hague gave in to pressure from the Sisi regime and lifted the seizure in the interests of its diplomatic relations. Against the application of international law. When the earthen pot fights against the iron pot …
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