Thu Feb 19, 6:13 PM ET
BEIRUT, Lebanon - Lebanon will return to Baghdad more than $15 million in Iraqi money seized on a plane that landed in Beirut, Lebanon's top legal official said Thursday.
Lebanese authorities confiscated 19.5 billion new Iraqi dinars from a private, Lebanese-owned plane that flew from Baghdad on Jan. 14.
They also arrested two Lebanese businessmen on the plane and a third who met them at the airport. All have been released on bail.
Lebanon's Prosecutor General Adnan Addoum said he decided to return the money after the Iraqi Foreign Ministry had sent a letter Feb. 14 demanding the dinars.
The confiscation of the new money came as Iraq's old bank notes — bearing former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein's portrait — became obsolete following a three-month period to exchange them for the new currency.
One of the arrested businessmen reportedly told police that most of the money was to pay for armored cars to protect Iraqi officials.
The Iraqi Interior Ministry said in a letter published in Beirut last month that the money was intended to pay for Iraqi government purchases.
Iraqi Governing Council members have visited Beirut and asked Lebanese officials to release the money, plus other Iraqi dinars held in Lebanese banks.