NEW YORK: US government prosecutors have asked South Korea to arrest a brother of former UN secretary general Ban Ki-moon indicted in New York on charges of bribery, an official confirmed on Friday.

An indictment unsealed on January 10 accuses Ban Ki Sang, a senior executive in a South Korean construction company, and his son Joo Hyun Bahn, a Manhattan real estate broker, over the attempted $800 million sale of a building in Hanoi.

During a court hearing in a federal court in New York on Friday, an assistant US attorney said a request had been made for the arrest of Ban.

The suspect, who was an executive at Keangnam Enterprises, a South Korean construction company, has not yet been arrested, the prosecutor told the court.

Ban’s brother stepped down from the helm of the United Nations on January 1, replaced by former Portuguese prime minister Antonio Guterres. Bahn is the former UN chief’s nephew.

Published in Dawn, January 22nd, 2017