Al-Emadi will face a criminal trial following his arrest in 2021 on allegations of embezzlement.
Qatar’s former Finance Minister Ali Sherif al-Emadi will face a criminal trial following his arrest in 2021 on allegations of embezzlement.
Al-Emadi was arrested in May 2021, but little has been made public about his case. He will face trial, with an unspecified number of others, on the charges, Qatar’s state news agency (QNA) said in a brief statement on Sunday.
“Given that the evidence extracted from the records showed that the defendants committed the crimes with which they are charged, the Office of the Attorney General of the Nation issued an order for the referral of the accused to the Criminal Chamber to punish them for the crimes with which they were charged, among those found bribery, appropriation of public property, money, abuse of office, abuse of power, damage to public money and money laundering,” the QNA report said.
The report did not elaborate on how much money the former minister is accused of stealing.
Al-Emadi rose to prominence in the Gulf Arab emirate when the current emir ascended the throne and after overseeing the transformation of the National Bank of Qatar into the Middle East’s biggest lender.
Once one of Qatar’s most powerful officials, al-Emadi also served as the bank’s chairman, on the board of Qatar’s sovereign wealth fund and as chairman of the executive board of Qatar Airways.
Al-Emadi has not publicly commented on the case.
The Reuters news agency reported that Qatari Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman al-Thani said the investigation related to his capacity as finance minister and not his positions at the sovereign wealth fund or the bank.