APRIL 2 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) — A bribery investigation at Swedish- Finnish telecoms company TeliaSonera appeared to widen from Uzbekistan, its initial focus, to other companies it owns in Central Asia and the South Caucasus after it said some other business deals may have been illegal. TeliaSonera owns Kcell, Kazakhstan’s largest mobile provider.
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(News report from Issue No. 179, published on April 9 2014)
APRIL 1 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) — Kazakh police arrested Valery Shevelyov, a director at Kazakh nuclear agency Kazatomprom, and his deputy, Serik Abdrazakov, for corruption. In 2009, Kazakhstan jailed Mukhtar Dzhakishev, then head of Kazatomprom and an opposition figurehead, for 14 years for corruption.
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(News report from Issue No. 178, published on April 2 2014)
MARCH 22 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) — It was only ever a matter of time.
Georgia’s government, a coalition called Georgian Dream that first won the 2012 parliamentary election and then the 2013 presidential election, has been going after former government ministers.
That’s the line taken by member of former president Mikheil Saakashvili’s government although the current government has said it is simply following its obligation to investigate alleged crimes.
Former ministers have been tried, and some found guilty, of corruption in what many observers have said is a witch hunt by rivals.
Now Georgia’s prosecution service has called up Mr Saakashvili for question on various cases ranging from the poisoning of a former PM to alleged government misspending and presidential pardons for convicted murderers.
The intent appears clear — to prove that Mr Saakashvili was corrupt and involved in various crimes. Last month his close ally, former PM Vano Merabishvili, was convicted of corruption and abuse of power and sentenced to five years in prison.
Mr Saakashvili has until March 27 to present himself at the prosecutor’s office in Tbilisi for questioning. He is currently in Brussels and has said that he has no intention of attending the hearing.
The United States which has been a long-term ally of Mr Saakashvili has said that it is concerned about the summons. As the United States is also a key ally of Georgia, this makes it harder for the government to pressure Mr Saakashvili into returning to Tbilisi to face awkward questions.
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(News report from Issue No. 177, published on March 26 2014)
MARCH 12 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) — Swiss investigators said they had started investigating Gulnara Karimova, the eldest daughter of Uzbek president Islam Karimov, for money laundering. They had previously been investigating four people linked to Ms Karimova. Ms Karimova is reportedly currently under house arrest in Tashkent.
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(News report from Issue No. 176, published on March 19 2014)
MARCH 17 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) — Uzbekistan is fast becoming a pariah state for businesses.
The US authorities opened corruption investigations into business conducted by Russia’s Vimpelom and Swedish-Finnish TeliaSonera in Uzbekistan, shortly after Swiss authorities announced they were looking into money laundering allegations against Gulnara Karimova, eldest daughter of Uzbek president Isam Karimov.
It’s not a pretty picture. Vimpelcom and TeliaSonera also have registered offices in the Netherlands, where the authorities have also launched investigations.
The trigger for these problems was a $330m deal that TeliaSonera struck with Gibraltar-registered Takilant to buy a 3G licence in 2007. Takilant was officially owned by Gayane Avakyan, an associate of Ms Karimova.
A Swedish investigation has been looking into whether this payment was actually a bribe to the Karimov family. Mr Karimov and his family have run Uzbekistan as their personal fiefdom since independence from the Soviet Union in 1991. They may also have had personal stakes in Uzbekistan’s big businesses.
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(News report from Issue No. 176, published on March 19 2014)
MARCH 18 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) — Turkmenistan’s parliament voted in a new anticorruption law, although in reality it is little more than window dressing.
The law basically states that civil servants are restricted from private business and opening foreign bank accounts. The thinking is, it seems, that government officials are prone to corruption temptations. Perhaps by banning officials from private business, the government hopes to look pro-active in defeating corruption.
It has a long way to go. Corruption is rife in Turkmenistan, as the US-based Heritage Foundation noted in its global report on economies in 2014.
“Corruption is widespread, with public officials often forced to bribe their way into their positions,” the Heritage Foundation wrote on Turkmenistan.
Out of the 178 countries it ranked, the Heritage Foundation placed Turkmenistan at the bottom for both “property rights” and “freedom from corruption”.
Passing legislation is one thing but acting on it is another.
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(News report from Issue No. 176, published on March 19 2014)
MARCH 14 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) — Ukrainian industrial magnate Dmitri Firtash, one of Ukraine’s richest people, is having a rough time.
Four days after Austrian police arrested Mr Firtash on various criminal charges, Tajikistan’s anti-corruption agency launched an investigation into a 2002 deal involving his Cyprus-based Khairok Holdings Company.
The deal saw Khairok Holdings buy a 75% stake in Tajik Azot, a factory that produces carbamide as a fertiliser.
The timing of the Tajik investigation is suspect. Languishing in an Austrian jail makes it difficult for Mr Firtash to defend his Tajik business.
And the outlook for Mr Firtash’s control of Tajik Azot does not look good. Officials at the anti-corruption agency noted that Zayd Saydov was minister of industry when the deal was signed. Saydov is not a favourite of the authorities. He is a rival to Tajik President Emomali Rakhmon and was jailed in December for 26 years for corruption, polygamy and sex with a minor.
At full capacity Tajik Azot, based 117km from Dushanbe, exported international standard Carbamide to countries across the former Soviet Union, employing over 800 people.
Since 2008, production at the plant has plummeted due to high prices of natural gas from Uzbekistan. Nevertheless as Tajikistan seeks to develop its own hydrocarbons sector the facility may assume a strategic role in the national economy once more. A nice asset to grab while you can.
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(News report from Issue No. 176, published on March 19 2014)
MARCH 11 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) — Turkmenistan was due to implement a new law that combats corruption. The law, passed last week by Turkmenistan’s parliament, makes it illegal for civil servants to open foreign bank accounts. Corruption is considered rife in Turkmenistan.
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(News report from Issue No. 175, published on March 12 2014)
FEB. 17 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) — A court in Tbilisi convicted Ivane Merabishvili, a former Georgian PM, of corruption and sentenced him to five years in jail. Merabishvili is the most senior member of Georgia’s former government to be convicted during a series of trials which they have been described as “politically motivated”.
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(News report from Issue No. 172, published on Feb. 19 2014)
FEB. 17 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) — It looks as if hostilities between Gulnara Karimova and her enemies have resumed.
The Prosecutor-General in Uzbekistan reported that police detained three associates of Ms Karimova, the eldest daughter of Uzbek President Islam Karimov, for alleged financial crimes linked to Terra Group, Prime Media and Gamma Productions.
Terra Group, Prime Media and Gamma Productions were Ms Karimova’s media companies until they were shut down in 2013.
Pressure has been building on Ms Karimova over the past six months. She has been trying to defend herself from her rivals, mostly in the Uzbek intelligence services, who want to derail any ambition she may harbour of becoming the next president of Uzbekistan.
Mr Karimov has been Uzbekistan’s president since the 1991 fall of the Soviet Union and, publicly at least, he hasn’t named a successor. Once one of the most powerful people in Uzbekistan, Ms Karimova has seen police raid her businesses and detain her associates.
One of those detained in police operations was Gayane Avakyan. Ms Avakyan will be well known to Swedish-Finnish telecoms company TeliaSonera. She was the owner of a Gibraltar-registered company that took a multi-million dollar payment in 2007/8 for a 3G licence in Uzbekistan.
Investigators are currently investigating the deal as they suspect it may have been a secret payment forwarded on to Ms Karimova.
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(News report from Issue No. 172, published on Feb. 19 2014)