Following up on Carlos Ghosn’s Oman Pot of Gold, a man has been arrested in the United Arab Emirates in May this year, as per the AFP which obtained the info from sources familiar with the matter. The Indian citizen was one of the five persons targeted by arrest warrants issued by the French justice in the investigation concerning Carlos Ghosn, the former boss of Renault- Nissan.
In June, the French Ministry of Justice transmitted an extradition request to the Emirati authorities, added this source.
Mr. Kumar, who also had responsibilities at Tata Motors, is the first man to be arrested out of the five arrest warrants issued on April 21, as part of a judicial investigation opened in February 2020 in Nanterre by French prosecutors.
An investigating judge suspects a money laundering scheme in an organized gang and corruption between Carlos Ghosn and four SBA officials.
The four officials are billionaire businessman and founder of SBA Suhail Bahwan, his two sons and the former managing director of SBA, Divyendu Kumar.
Mr. Kumar is accused of “organized money laundering”, “misuse of corporate assets” and “active corruption” with Carlos Ghosn being the beneficiary.
According to a source close to the investigation, serious or concordant indications lead to the suspicion that Carlos Ghosn ordered the payment of bonuses from Renault to the SBA distributor, “masked by a certain number of accounting entries”, and part of which was then sent to screen companies belonging to Carlos Ghosn’s entourage.
Over the years, SBA, which obtained the Oman market in 2005, has extended its distribution scope – Saudi Arabia in 2010, Iran in 2013 – to become an important partner of Renault.
After the arrest warrants were issued in April, Renault announced that it had initiated a strategic review of its relationship with SBA. Since then, “this review has been completed and the contract with SBA has not been renewed,” said a source familiar with the matter to AFP.
In addition to the investigation in Nanterre, Carlos Ghosn is targeted by a judicial investigation in Paris relating to the contracts signed by a subsidiary of Renault Nissan, RNBV, and by an arrest warrant from the Japanese justice, country where he was to be tried for financial embezzlement before it fled to Lebanon at the end of 2019.
