Bashar al-Assad’s cousin is in Army Intelligence custody
MTV’s website learned that Army Intelligence raided a drug trafficking network in the Baalbek area on Thursday night, arresting several people, including Suleiman Hilal al-Assad, a cousin of ousted Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, and Ali, the son of detained drug trafficker Nouh Zaiter.
The detainees were reportedly under the influence of drugs and were taken to Ablah Barracks.
It is worth noting that Suleiman al-Assad fled to Lebanon after being accused of killing Brigadier General and engineer Hassan al-Sheikh, a Syrian regime officer, in front of his children and wife in the city of Latakia on August 7, 2015. At the time, Syria’s official news agency SANA announced that he had been arrested. A Syrian criminal court later sentenced him to 20 years in prison for murder in January 2016.
Suleiman is the son of Hilal al-Assad, commander of Syria’s National Defense Forces, who was killed in March 2014 in battles against opposition fighters in the Latakia countryside.
