BEIRUT, Lebanon, Jan 31, 2004 (AP Online via COMTEX) -- Lebanon has agreed to return to Iraq $15.6 million that it confiscated from a plane at Beirut's airport in early January, a member of the Iraqi Governing Council said Saturday.

Mouwafak al-Rubaie spoke to reporters about the cash after talks with Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri. Airport officials seized the money - 19.5 billion Iraqi dinars - after it was found on a private plane that flew in from Baghdad on Jan. 14.

One of the Lebanese businessman on the plane, Mohammed Assem Abu Darwish, who was arrested and then released, was quoted as telling police that the money was to pay mainly for armored cars to protect Iraqi officials.

"We discussed many issues, including the issue of money in dinars held in Beirut," al-Rubaie said of his Hariri meeting. "This issue is in its final phase. God willing, this money will be released and returned to Iraq."

Al-Rubaie said Lebanon had also promised to return the funds that Iraq deposited in Lebanese banks during the regime of ousted President Saddam Hussein. But he did not give a date for when this would happen.

Lebanese authorities have said the money will be returned when Iraq has a sovereign government. Lebanon has not given a figure for the money, but the U.S. Treasury has said it amounts to $495 million.

Also Saturday, Al-Rubaie met Lebanon's top Shiite Muslim cleric, Ayatollah Sheik Mohammed Hussein Fadlallah.

He said Fadlallah wanted to see a quick end to the U.S.-led occupation of Iraq, and that he explained to the sheik the process by which the occupying powers are scheduled to hand over authority to an Iraqi government on June 30.