«Written by Luis A. Cabrera, OSINT Analyst»
In the world of high politics and global business, perfect coincidences rarely exist.
When the threads of a scandal cross oceans, from the shores of the Mediterranean in Lebanon to the Caribbean waters of the Dominican Republic, the question is no longer what happened, but who benefited.
What do a powerful and controversial Lebanese politician and the president of the Dominican Republic have in common?
At first glance, the geographic and cultural distance would seem absolute. Yet they are linked by a shared heritage, a series of private meetings, and a name that today echoes with suspicion in the ports of both countries: Karpowership.
The power barges of this Turkish company promise immediate electricity to nations in energy crisis. An energy crisis that President Luis Abinader has never acknowledged in his speeches, but behind their floating smokestacks travels a trail of opacity.
To understand the arrival of these barges in Azúa, we must first journey to the collapse of the Middle East.
Because before Karpowership fired up its engines in the Dominican Republic, it had already left an indelible mark on Lebanese courts.
WHO IS GEBRAN BASSIL?
Gebran Bassil. For the United States Department of State, this name is synonymous with grand corruption. Formally sanctioned by Washington, Bassil has been accused of using his political influence for personal gain and of weaving dark financial networks.
But his ambition reached far beyond Lebanon's borders.
During Michel Aoun's presidency, serving as Minister of Foreign Affairs, Bassil was the architect behind the LDE, the Lebanese Diaspora Energy organization. Various political analysts and international outlets such as Al Arabiya denounced that this organization was not merely a cultural bridge.
It was, according to those reports, a collusion between Lebanon's Investment Development Authority, known as IDAL, and the foreign ministry, designed to recruit wealthy diaspora members and create alleged channels for money laundering and funding for Hezbollah.
Source: https://english.alarabiya.net/views/news/middle-east/2019/10/03/Hezbollah-and-its-Christian-allies-are-hijacking-the-Lebanese-diaspora
An institutionalized alliance. IDAL's own General Manager, Nabil Itani, admitted it publicly to The Business Year magazine, confirming that the initiative was a unified effort among the private sector, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and IDAL.
Source: https://thebusinessyear.org/interview/staying-positive/
A machinery that eventually came under international scrutiny. To date, the United States government has sanctioned two key figures from this network for their direct ties to Hezbollah financing.
Among them, Alaa Hassan Hamieh, who oversaw a web of companies operating in Lebanon, Syria, Poland, Slovenia, and Qatar, and who allegedly diverted millions of dollars.
Source: https://home.treasury.gov/news/press-releases/sb0420
The connection between the LDE and IDAL was neither casual nor informal. Gebran Bassil, in his role as Minister of Foreign Affairs, and Mazen Sweid, president of Lebanon's Investment Development Authority, formally signed a memorandum of cooperation designed to organize the relationship between IDAL and Lebanese missions abroad.
What makes this document particularly revealing is that two of the names tied to that institutional alliance, Gebran Bassil and Alaa Hamieh, were subsequently sanctioned by the United States government for financing Hezbollah.
This is not, therefore, a matter of mere suspicion: it is a network documented on paper, signed by its own architects, and later condemned by the international community.
Source: https://www.mtv.com.lb/news/1011475
The Lebanese Diaspora Energy organization became so thoroughly discredited that, according to reports from the newspaper Lorient-Le Jour, the current Lebanese government discontinued the program. Lebanon's formal diplomatic apparatus moved swiftly to sever any connection to those activities.
Source: https://www.lorientlejour.com/article/1488449/la-diplomatie-libanaise-dement-tout-lien-avec-levenement-lebanese-diaspora-energy-.html
ABINADER + BASSIL / KARPOWERSHIP
This is where the plot thickens. If Gebran Bassil's track record and the warnings about this network were an open secret in international geopolitics, why did Dominican President Luis Abinader meet with these Lebanese Diaspora figures on two separate occasions?
Did the Dominican head of state know who he was sitting across from?
The doubts multiply as the pattern repeats itself. Lebanon contracted Karpowership's barges under Bassil's management, when he served as energy minister.
An investigation by Lebanese television channel Al Jadeed blew the lid off the situation: leaked recordings revealed that company representatives allegedly agreed to distribute a six-million-dollar commission among officials.
Source: https://today.lorientlejour.com/article/1269444/juicy-contract-suspicious-call-for-tenders-in-the-murky-waters-of-lebanons-floating-power-plants-part-i-of-ii.html
A major scandal that led a Lebanese prosecutor to threaten to seize the barges and fine the company for alleged corruption.
The company itself reacted by describing those events as contrary to the rule of law, and maintained that the recordings about the alleged commissions had been fabricated.
Source: https://www.lorientlejour.com/article/1263642/le-directeur-de-karpowership-maintient-que-les-enregistrements-lincriminant-sont-falsifies.html
It must be noted that Karpowership was never convicted, nor was any defendant formally sentenced for these allegations. The main suspect reportedly fled Lebanon and his whereabouts remain unknown.
Furthermore, an analysis published by Lorient-Le Jour found that Karpowership generated an estimated 750 million dollars in profit over eight years of operation in Lebanon, while the Lebanese state paid more than 1.5 billion dollars since Bassil signed the first contract in 2013.
As a result, the analysis concluded that it would have been cheaper for Lebanon to purchase its own power barges outright.
Source: https://today.lorientlejour.com/article/1269444/juicy-contract-suspicious-call-for-tenders-in-the-murky-waters-of-lebanons-floating-power-plants-part-i-of-ii.html
According to that same source, what was presented as a temporary solution in Lebanon stretched nearly eight years. The same promise was made in the Dominican Republic in 2021, and the contract is expected to span the entire eight years of President Abinader's administration.
Source: https://listindiario.com/la-republica/20250825/barcazas-electricas-azua-solucion-temporal-medio-crisis-energetica_871397.html
THE TIES THAT RAISE QUESTIONS
In November 2016, Luis Abinader, then a presidential candidate, hosted a private lunch for Gebran Bassil in the Dominican Republic. The event was published on Abinader's own Twitter account.
Source: https://www.diariolibre.com/actualidad/politica/abinader-ofrecera-almuerzo-a-ministro-de-exteriores-del-libano-EF5564035
Months later, in May 2017, Abinader traveled to Lebanon to deliver the opening address at the LDE Diaspora Energy conference, the very same event that today falls under scrutiny for alleged ties to Hezbollah.
During that address, Abinader publicly praised Bassil. His words, recorded in a video published on his own YouTube channel, are telling:
"I congratulate the great work of Minister Gebran, who with great vision has reached every corner where there are Lebanese to seek them out and tell us that Lebanon would not exist without you. In over 160 years of Lebanese presence in the Dominican Republic, no Lebanese minister had ever visited us."
Source, see minute 7:20: https://youtu.be/OwuSoxrQWEc?is=rKi2vp89jXXlOG7j
Source 2: https://www.lde-leb.com/files/2017booklet.pdf
A WARNING FROM A BEIRUT UNIVERSITY PROFESSOR
Professor Makram Rabah of the American University of Beirut published in Al Arabiya that Hezbollah and its allies used the Lebanese diaspora network not only to plan attacks, but also for money laundering campaigns and propaganda.
Source: https://english.alarabiya.net/views/news/middle-east/2019/10/03/Hezbollah-and-its-Christian-allies-are-hijacking-the-Lebanese-diaspora
On November 6, 2020, just days after Abinader assumed the Dominican presidency, the United States government officially designated Gebran Bassil as a corrupt political leader and sanctioned him for his ties to Hezbollah.
Source: https://lb.usembassy.gov/us-designates-bassil/
Nevertheless, five months after that Lebanese scandal erupted, in December 2021, the Dominican administration signed a contract with Karpowership.
Source: https://www.diariolibre.com/planeta/medioambiente/2025/09/16/evaluan-propuesta-de-modificacion-al-permiso-de-las-barcazas/3246008
THE DOMINICAN CAUTION
What was promised as a temporary, emergency solution in 2021 now threatens to become a permanent fixture.
Karpowership's barges arrived in the Dominican Republic under unusual circumstances: the government had declared a national emergency over the crisis at the Punta Catalina power plant, whose coal supply had been allowed to run out during Abinader's own administration.
The initial contract contemplated operations through 2026, with the possibility of renewal. However, satellite tracking records cited by independent analysts indicate that some of these barges moved directly from Cuba to Dominican shores.
Source: https://www.bnamericas.com/en/news/karpowership-secures-dominican-rep-power-generation-test-nod
Environmental complaints quickly followed. The Ministry of Environment and Natural Resources stated that it had not received an environmental assessment request when the barges arrived in the country. Years later, the company formally applied for an environmental permit.
Rather than responding with caution, the Abinader government signed new national emergency decrees to bring in more barges from the same company, some of them coming from Cuba.
In place of transparency, the institutional response has been the push for regulations denounced by the press as a gag law, a legal attempt to silence investigations and shut down dissenting voices.
As a consequence, the central question dividing Dominican public opinion emerges:
Is the deterioration of the national electricity system the result of innocent negligence, or is it a deliberate collapse designed to justify these multimillion-dollar contracts?
THE QUESTIONS STILL FLOATING IN THE AIR
Two countries separated by thousands of miles, bound together by the same company and the same cast of Lebanese political actors.
In Lebanon, the scheme collapsed, leaving behind a trail of judicial investigations, arrests, and international sanctions. In the Dominican Republic, the story is still being written.
Therefore, the questions are unavoidable: did Luis Abinader know who Gebran Bassil was when he met with him on two occasions? Why did the Dominican Republic contract Karpowership under the same opaque patterns being investigated in Lebanon, just months after the scandal broke?
What explains the institutional resistance to investigating, disclosing information, and providing answers?
To date, those key questions remain unanswered from the National Palace. The air, without question, already smells bad.
