A 37-year-old Keralite is being investigated by Bulgarian security agency in connection with the pager explosions in Lebanon earlier this week. Nearly 20 Hezbollah members were killed and over thousands injured in a synchronised attack, after users received a message they believed had come from their commanders.
Kerala-born Rinson Jose, who is now a Norwegian citizen, founded Norta Global, a Bulgarian company which was behind the pager's deal, according to Telex, a Hungarian media outlet.
A number of leading media outlets reported on Friday that Rinson Jose was born in Wayanad and moved to Norway after completing his MBA. Some of the local TV channels also spoke to his relatives.
Rinson's father, Jose Moothedam, is a tailor. He is known as 'Tailor Jose' in the locality, reported Manorama Online.
How Rinson Jose Came Under Lens
The pager explosions in Lebanon triggered a wild goose chase as the world tried to understand how Israeli spy agencies managed to rig the device with explosives. The focus soon shifted to locating the manufacturer – and soon narrowed down to Taiwanese company Gold Apollo.
However, Hsu Ching-Kuang, founder of Gold Apollo said that the "product is not ours. It only had our brand on it". He linked the exploding pagers to a Hungary-based company, BAC Consulting, which had a three-year licensing agreement with his firm.
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It later emerged that BAC Consulting was "simply an intermediary in the transaction".
"The managing director of BAC Consulting, Cristiana Bársony-Arcidiacono, dealt with a Bulgarian company, Norta Global Ltd, based in Sofia," reported Telex.
This Bulgaria company is reportedly founded by Rinson Jose, a 37-year old person born in Wayanad, Kerala.
According to Telex, Norta Global was actually the one behind the pagers deal.
Norta Global Registered With 'Headquarters Service Provider' That Hosts 196 Other Companies
Middle East-focused website The Cradle reported that Norta Global was founded in 2022 by Rinson Jose. The company was located at a residential address in Sofia, Bulgaria's capital, and registered with a "headquarters service provider", which hosts 196 other companies, it said.
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Rinson Jose and his Norta Global have been given a clean chit by Bulgaria's National Security Agency (SANS) after its investigations established that no communication equipment "corresponding to those that exploded on September 17 was imported, exported or manufactured in Bulgaria".
In a statement SANS said there was no record that the pagers entered the European Union legally via Bulgaria, adding that the Bulgarian customs had not registered the products.