Former U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft is wading into the turbulent waters of the Middle East.

John Ashcroft (AP Photo/Cliff Owen, File)

The 69-year-old’s consulting firm, The Ashcroft Group LLC, has been hired by an affiliate of France’s Societe Generale SA to facilitate its takeover of the Beirut-headquartered, Lebanese-Canadian Bank.

This could prove tricky.

The U.S. Treasury Department in February formally accused the LCB of operating as a major “money-laundering” concern on behalf of the Lebanese militia and political party, Hezbollah. The Treasury specifically accused the LCB of laundering hundreds of millions of dollars in revenues from narcotics sales on behalf of Hezbollah, which the U.S. designates a terrorist entity. The LCB denied the charge.

Still, the Treasury Department’s action forced Lebanon’s central bank to seek a new owner for the LCB. And this week, Societe Generale de Banque au Liban, which is 19% owned by Societe Generale in Paris, finalized its takeover of LCB. Ashcroft Group, subsequently, has been hired by the SGBL to ensure that the accounts of the new bank are clean and that the management has broken from the LCB’s past practices…