Interpol may have issued an arrest warrant for Isabel Dos Santos, daughter of former Angolan president José Eduardo dos Santos, under investigation for embezzlement of public funds, although sources close to the businesswoman deny to the Portuguese news agency Lusa any knowledge of this warrant, which was reported by the same media on Friday.
According to the document to which the agency had access, between 2015 and 2017, the businesswoman created financial mechanisms «with the intention of obtaining illicit financial gains and covering up suspicious criminal operations», through «information on public funds of the Angolan state», which she achieved as administrator of the state oil company Sonangol.
Angolan authorities opened proceedings against Dos Santos in 2020 for alleged corruption, including charges of embezzlement and money laundering, in connection with her activities when she was president of Sonagol, less than a week after more than 700,000 leaked documents from the business empire she heads came to light in what became known as ‘Luanda Leaks’.
The documents reveal that the daughter of the former Angolan president obtained lucrative contracts in the oil, diamond and telecommunications industries during Dos Santos’ presidency, as well as that Western companies helped Isabel dos Santos to take money out of the African country.
José Eduardo dos Santos left office in 2017 after three decades in power and was succeeded by Joao Lourenço, a man he trusted who, since coming to power, has launched numerous anti-corruption campaigns against the former president’s close circle.
According to this document, Isabel dos Santos is wanted for «crimes of embezzlement, swindling, illicit participation in business, criminal association and influence peddling, as well as money laundering», amounting to some 200 million euros, with a maximum penalty of 12 years in prison.
On the other hand, and «in view of the news published about the international arrest warrant», an official source of Isabel dos Santos has assured that he is unaware of Interpol’s instructions and is intrigued that the businesswoman is being sought, after «almost three years of existence of such processes», in which «she «never constituted herself as a defendant».
