Antoine Kassis, a Lebanese-Syrian national, was sentenced on Thursday to 20 years in prison for conspiring to support Colombia’s National Liberation Army, a U.S.-designated terror group, and 30 years for narco-terrorism conspiracy, the U.S. Justice Department said.
The 59-year-old will serve the terms concurrently, meaning he will serve at total of 30 years at most, the department said.
The Lebanon-based drug trafficker used his ties to Syria’s former Assad regime to arrange shipments of military-grade weapons to the Colombian terror group in exchange for hundreds of kilograms of cocaine. Kassis claimed to be a cousin of former Syrian president Bashar Assad and said that he worked with the former president’s younger brother, Maher Assad, and other senior Syrian military officials.
He planned to import 500 kilograms of cocaine through Syria’s Port of Latakia and oversee its distribution across the Middle East. Evidence presented at trial showed that his co-conspirators moved nearly $100 million in less than 18 months and laundered money for criminal organizations, including the Sinaloa Cartel and Hamas, according to the Justice Department.
Kassis was arrested in Kenya and extradited to the United States in May 2025.
