Bahrain Central Bank orders to freeze assets of Qatar-linked blacklist

DUBAI -11 June 2017: Bahrain's central bank ordered banks operating in the kingdom to freeze assets and bank accounts of the Qatar-linked 59 individuals and 12 entities that a group of Saudi-led Arab countries have accused of links to terrorism, the state news agency BNA reported on Sunday.

The move came after Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Egypt and Bahrain, who have isolated Qatar by cutting all diplomatic and transport links with it last week, put dozens of figures linked to the country on blacklists.

"The central bank issued a directive to all the financial institutions licensed in the kingdom of Bahrain to freeze accounts, cash, deposits, investments, insurance policies and all the financial transactions of the individuals and entities that were on the terrorism list," BNA said.

The central bank asked also the banks to provide any information they hold on the members of the list as soon as possible, the statement said.

UAE central bank has also instructed the banks operating in the country to do the same on Friday.