SAO PAULO (Reuters) - Brazilian police have arrested a man designated by the U.S. Treasury Department as a high-ranking Hezbollah financier after neighbouring Paraguay sought his detention on identity theft charges, authorities in Brazil said on Friday.
In 2004, U.S. authorities designated Assad Ahmad Barakat as one of Hezbollah's "most prominent and influential members." They said he had long served as a treasurer for the group and was an associate of the then-financial director of Hezbollah, a militant group based in Lebanon.