Khaddam: Syria’s $12 Billion in Reserves Were Registered in Hafez al-Assad’s Name

In Khaddam’s account, the matter did not remain merely procedural; it developed into an internal crisis when the president received a document indicating that a sum of money had been withdrawn from the account held in his name abroad. Assad was surprised and asked the bank for the transfer document. A few days later, a copy of the request arrived, and upon examining the signature, it was found to be forged. The bank was asked who the recipient of the transfer—$65 million—was, and it turned out to be Mahmoud al-Zoubi, the prime minister.

Khaddam recounts that Hafez al-Assad was furious and instructed one of the heads of the security services to summon al-Zoubi and warn him to return the money or face execution. The money was indeed returned to the bank.

The memoirs place the incident within the broader trajectory of al-Zoubi himself, who remained prime minister from November 1987 until March 2000, making his tenure the longest premiership since the establishment of the Syrian state in 1918.

Khaddam paints a harsh portrait of a man who “slipped not only into facilitating corruption, but also into practicing it.” He recounts how al-Zoubi built his network of influence upward toward the offices of Basil al-Assad and Muhammad Makhlouf, while Khaddam himself had been raising the issue of corruption with Hafez al-Assad since 1989, only to receive the response: “Where do you get this information from? Reality is different from what you are saying.”