Iraq’s envoy says body found in Beirut is Alwani’s, DNA test pending

BAGHDAD — Iraq’s ambassador to Lebanon said Wednesday that a body found in Beirut is that of former Iraqi lawmaker Ahmed al-Alwani, as officials work to speed up DNA testing and bring the body to Baghdad.

“We have confirmed that the body belongs to former MP Ahmed al-Alwani, and we are working to speed up the procedures for DNA testing, receiving Alwani’s body and transferring it to Baghdad,” Ambassador Mohammed Reda al-Husseini told the state-run Iraqi News Agency.

Husseini said the body was viewed at the government hospital in Zahle, in Lebanon’s Bekaa Valley, with embassy staff and Alwani’s brother-in-law present, and that the viewing confirmed it was his. The body had decomposed and most of its features were gone. Because of that, Lebanon’s top prosecutor, Judge Ahmed Rami al-Hajj, ordered a DNA test to establish its identity conclusively, Husseini said. He added that matching the DNA would take some time.

“Suspicions surround people who accompanied Ahmed al-Alwani from the hotel to the apartment where he was found killed,” Husseini said. “We are following the Lebanese security investigations to uncover the circumstances of Ahmed al-Alwani’s killing and identify the perpetrators.”

Husseini did not name the hotel or say how many people were under suspicion. Alwani’s media office said in a timeline released Wednesday that, according to the information available to it, he did not stay at any hotel on the day he arrived in Beirut, Nov. 5. The office also said people seen in surveillance footage left the apartment 14 minutes after his flight from Erbil landed.

Lebanese Prime Minister Nawaf Salam condemned the killing on Wednesday and praised the judicial and security agencies working to uncover its circumstances. Beirut “cannot remain an arena for crime and lawlessness,” he said.

Alwani’s body was found in Beirut on Tuesday. That day, Husseini said Lebanon’s judiciary had opened an investigation and assigned a special judge to the case.

Alwani, a Sunni former MP from Anbar, played a prominent role in the 2012-2013 Anbar protests against the government of Nouri al-Maliki, then prime minister. Security forces arrested him on Dec. 28, 2013, in a raid on his Ramadi home that killed his brother and several guards.

A court sentenced him to death in 2014, and he was freed in 2025 under Iraq’s General Amnesty Law.