The loan agreements and any subsequent re-mortgage agreements between two supposedly independent and private companies, Nylam and Briana, not known to be linked to Hafez, could be used as a pretext with banks for money moving from Syria and Lebanon to Russia or vice versa.

Letters requesting comment from Haytham Abbas, Hassan Sharif, Briana and Nylam in Lebanon were undeliverable, while attempts to reach Abbas and Sharif through the three Russian companies they own went unanswered.

Hafez would not, on the face of it, appear to need to disguise his identity to do business in Russia. The Makhloufs are not sanctioned by Russia, and there is evidence that Hafez has lived and operated in Russia freely for several years. Hafez and his wife appear to have spent time in Moscow from at least August 2013, when their Russian driving licenses were issued. They bought a three-bed property not far from the Moscow skyscrapers in September 2015. They registered a Porsche Cayenne and Mercedes GL350 to that address, property documents and leaked traffic databases unearthed by Global Witness show, indicating that they lived in the apartment.

Given the Makhloufs’ ability to operate freely in Russia, the use of a complex loan structure that obscures the origin of the money seems unnecessary if the funds were intended to simply stay in Russia, suggesting the money may be moving through Russia and into other jurisdictions.

The Russian Bank



Russia’s biggest bank, Sberbank, provided banking services for at least one of the Russian property companies formerly owned by Hafez and now owned by Briana, a Russian corporate database shows.

As the loans from Nylam to Hafez’s Russian companies were international (coming into Russia from Lebanon), it is feasible that they were transacted in US dollars, which is the commonly used international currency. If that were the case, the money could have transited through Sberbank’s SWIFT payment system, which, according to anti-money laundering expert Graham Barrow, could risk breaching the terms of the US sanctions against Hafez Makhlouf.

The convoluted nature of the loans taken against the properties should have raised red flags with Sberbank, but it is unclear what due diligence was carried out on the loans.

Sberbank’s dealings with the Makhloufs are part of a broader pattern of major Russian banks helping the Syrian regime. In 2012 and 2013, both Reuters and Wall Street Journal reported that the al-Assad regime held accounts at Gazprombank and VTB, two of Russia’s largest banks, which, like Sberbank, have extensive international correspondent banking relationships.

While Sberbank in Russia is not bound by EU or US sanctions law, it does have branches in major European and US financial centres, including London, Frankfurt and New York. Sberbank also has dozens of correspondent banking relationships, and Euro and US dollar clearing accounts.

Sberbank’s business with the Makhlouf-linked companies could present compliance risks to other banks transacting with Sberbank and should be a red flag to regulators in the jurisdictions in which the Makhloufs are sanctioned and Sberbank has a presence.

Sberbank did not respond to a request for comment. In past comments to the media, Sberbank has said that “professionalism, transparency and integrity are the bank’s core values” and “the bank has zero tolerance for those who act contrary.”

The Makhloufs' Other Properties



Several other Makhlouf family members purchased property in Moscow skyscrapers between 2013 and 2019. Razan Othman, wife of Hafez’s brother Rami Makhlouf and daughter of the Syrian Ambassador to Romania, purchased one of the first office spaces in December 2013 in the ‘City of Capitals’ towers, according to Russian property records. Razan has been under EU sanctions since 2012 because of her marriage to Rami.

Rami was sanctioned in 2011 by the EU for being the ‘principal financer’ of al-Assad and ‘bankroll[ing] the regime allowing violence against demonstrators’. He had already been sanctioned in 2008 by the US for acquiring his wealth through kleptocratic means. Rami owns Syriatel, Syria’s national telecommunications company, as well as several large holding companies with interests in oil, gas and aviation. He was dubbed ‘the king of Syria’ due to his huge sway over the country’s politics and economy.

Rami’s adult children, who are not sanctioned, openly flaunt their wealth on social media, offering a glimpse into their luxury lifestyles. They regularly post pictures on Instagram of their expensive cars, private jet, and their holidays in Europe, Dubai, Moscow and Syria. Rami’s eldest son, Mohammed Rami Makhlouf, is seemingly trying to establish an international image for himself as a millionaire entrepreneur and philanthropist at the age of 21. A PR agency was used to place articles in English language publications promoting Mohammed Rami Makhlouf’s future business plans and discussing his taste in private jets.

This August Rami’s two sons spent around a month partying in Mykonos, Greece and France, while al-Assad and Russia rained bombs down on Idlib, displacing even more Syrians in a conflict which has already led to millions of refugees being forced to flee the country.



Rami Makhlouf’s children must have received visas from an EU state in order to travel freely in Europe, but it is unclear which country issued them. Among EU states, only Romania, Bulgaria and the Czech Republic have maintained relations with the Syrian regime, though other member states are apparently looking to re-establish them.

In addition to Hafez’s and Rami’s wife’s property acquisitions, Iyad and Ihab Makhlouf, twins and the youngest of the four Makhlouf brothers, used a Russian-registered company to purchase half a floor in in Moscow’s ‘Federation’ tower in February 2019, worth US$9.5 million. The two men also bought one property in their own names and two parking spaces in ‘City of Capitals’ in June 2017.