Tag Archives: corruption

TeliaSonera sacks managers over Uzbek and Kazakh deals

DEC. 16 2013 (The Conway Bulletin) — Swedish telecoms company TeliaSonera sacked another top executive from its Eurasian division which has been linked to murky deals in both Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan.

The allegations of dubious deals bring into focus the links between the Uzbek and Kazakh elites and Western companies’ desire to tap into markets.

Media reported that Veysel Aral, head of TeliaSonera’s Eurasia unit, was fired after only 10 months in the job.

He took over in February from Tero Kivisaari who had been head of the unit in 2007 when it made a $350m payment to a Gibraltar-registered company linked to Gulnara Karimova, the eldest daughter of Uzbek President Islam Karimov, in return for a 3G licence.

Swedish media released details of that deal a couple of years ago triggering an internal investigation that has led to several high-level resignations and sackings at TeliaSonera.

Before Mr Aral took over from Mr Kivisaari as head of TeliaSonera’s Eurasia unit he had been in charge of KCell, TeliaSonera’s Kazakhstan subsidiary. Earlier this month a Swedish newspaper also raised questions over a $200m deal in 2012 by KCell to buy telecoms infrastructure from companies owned by Karim Massimov, head of Kazakhstan’s presidential administration.

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(News report from Issue No. 165, published on Dec. 18 2013)

Kazakh police raids paper-maker Kagazy

DEC. 11 2013 (The Conway Bulletin) — Police in Almaty raided the HQ of London-listed Kazakh paper-maker Kagazy and accused it of being involved in various illegal dealings including tax evasion, the company said. Kagazy is currently the focus of a legal dispute in a London court. The company said that raids in Almaty may be linked to the case.

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(News report from Issue No. 165, published on Dec. 18 2013)

TeliaSonera accused of unethical business in Kazakhstan

DEC. 6 2013 (The Conway Bulletin) — A Swedish newspaper accused telecoms company TeliaSonera of making unethical deals in Kazakhstan. TeliaSonera bought telephone networks from two companies with close connections to the head of the Kazakh presidential administration, Karim Massimov, in 2012 for about $200m, Swedish newspaper Dagens Nyheter reported.

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(News report from Issue No. 164, published on Dec. 11 2013)

High-profile officials on trial in Kazakhstan

DEC. 4 2013 (The Conway Bulletin) — Kazakhstan’s Prosecutor-General has accused Bergei Ryskaliyev, the former governor of the Atyrau region, of stealing 71b tenge ($460m).

But the charges against Mr Ryskaliyev don’t stop there. The latest allegation is that he illegally allocated land for the construction of mosques and that he had links to unspecified terrorist groups.

It been a fast fall from grace for the 46-year-old Mr Ryskaliyev. He was governor of the Atyrau region until August 2012 when he, officially at least, was moved aside because of ill health. Since then Mr Ryskaliyev has been on the run with his brother, dodging the Kazakh authorities.

It was also in August 2012 that his main ally, Aslan Musin lost his job as head of the Kazakh presidential staff, one of the most influential jobs in Kazakhstan.

In Kazakhstan’s rough and tumble world of politics and business, your so-called “krisha” or roof is one of your most important defences.

And if your krisha goes, you’re in trouble, analysts said. “The legal action against the Ryskalievs might be a power play towards the more prominent Musin,” said an Almaty-based analyst who wished to remain anonymous.

Also in August 2012, Mr Ryskaliev’s sister Gulzhanar was accused of a high-profile murder and the family assets in Switzerland were frozen upon allegations of money laundering.

The case of Mr Ryskaliev is important to foreign investors as it shows how closely aligned politics, corruption and crime is in Kazakhstan.

It’s not the only high-profile corruption against officials, though.

A court in Geneva froze the assets of former mayor of Almaty, Viktor Khrapunov, in November 2012 on suspicion of money laundering and in Astana, Anar Meshimbayeva, former chairwoman of the statistics agency, is facing charges of stealing 750 m tenge ($4.9m) in 2009.

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(News report from Issue No. 164, published on Dec. 11 2013)

Global Witness unveils corruption in Azerbaijan

DEC. 10 2013 (The Conway Bulletin) — Global Witness, the anti-corruption lobby group, published a report that alleged widespread use of offshore accounts and shell companies to move cash out of state-owned energy company SOCAR. Azerbaijan denied any wrongdoing.

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(News report from Issue No. 164, published on Dec. 11 2013)

Global Witness investigates Azerbaijan’s SOCAR

DEC. 10 2013 (The Conway Bulletin) — Profits from SOCAR, Azerbaijan’s state-owned energy company, are disappearing offshore through a network of faceless companies controlled by one mysterious man.

That’s the short version of how Azerbaijan’s energy sector is run according to the London-based anti-corruption lobby group Global Witness in their new report entitled “Azerbaijan Anonymous”.

“While SOCAR and its partners may well have acted within the law, the lack of transparency about SOCAR’s partners and how they came to be involved in the Azerbaijani oil industry raises questions over potential conflicts of interest, preferential treatment, and the risk of corruption,” Global Witness wrote.

SOCAR has denied that it has done anything illegal and said in response: “The Republic of Azerbaijan is a founding member of the Extractive Industry Transparency Initiative (EITI) task force subjecting the reviews of SOCAR to thorough examination and auditing.”

The EITI is a group set up to monitor whether resource-rich countries spend their revenues responsibly. Global Witness’s report criticised EITI too and said it was a weak institution with little genuine influence.

On Azerbaijan, the Global witness report said that Anar Aliyev, the mysterious owner of several companies linked to SOCAR, was virtually unknown and that he was working on behalf of several higher profile individuals. It said that Mr Aliyev was formally responsible for dozens of companies which have generated $375m profit over five years.

Aliyev is a common surname in Azerbaijan and Anar Aliyev has no family connection with Ilham Aliyev, Azerbaijan’s president.

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(News report from Issue No. 164, published on Dec. 11 2013)

MP jailed in Azerbaijan

DEC. 2 2013 (The Conway Bulletin) — A court in Baku jailed former Azerbaijani MP Gular Akhmadova for three years for corruption. In 2005, Akhmadova had tried to extort a $1m bribe from the owner of an Azerbaijani university in exchange for a seat in parliament.

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(News report from Issue No. 163, published on Dec. 4 2013)

Corruption is falling in Azerbaijan

DEC. 4 2013 (The Conway Bulletin) — Corruption is still rife in Azerbaijan but it is falling, Transparency International (TI) said in its 2013 Corruptions Perception Index.

The index is important as it is widely read and acts as a sort of early warning system over which way corruption levels are heading. For Azerbaijan, TI reckoned that things are improving.

Azerbaijan has climbed to 127th position in the 177 country index. This is still relatively low for the aspiring energy exporter–– it has Pakistan, Gambia and Mali for company — but is still an improvement on 139th position in 2012.

According to the data nearly 70% of Azerbaijanis think that the government is doing a decent job combating corruption.

Importantly, though, most people think corruption is still a problem.

(News report from Issue No. 163, published on Dec. 4 2013)

New accusations emerge on former Kazakh governor

DEC. 4 2013 (The Conway Bulletin) — Kazakhstan’s Prosecutor-General accused the former governor of the Atyrau region, Bergei Ryskaliyev, of having links to radical Islamic groups. Mr Ryskaliyev has been on the run for over a year. He is also accused of stealing $460m.

(News report from Issue No. 164, published on Dec. 11 2013)

Kazakhstan drops in Transparency International index

DEC. 4 2013 (The Conway Bulletin) — Kazakhstan has dropped seven places in this year’s Transparency International (TI) Corruption Perception Index to 140th position.

This is not good. There are only 177 countries in the index, meaning that Kazakhstan is firmly anchored in the bottom 20% of the most corrupt countries in the world.

And it’s hardly keeping stellar company. Honduras, Laos and Uganda share the 140th position berth and from the former Soviet Union only Ukraine, Kyrgyzstan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan are ranked lower.

“The picture is rather gloomy and can be described as stagnation across all the countries,” Svetlana Savitskaya, TI’s program coordinator for Central Asia told Radio Free Europe of the former Soviet countries’ rankings.

Of people interviewed for the index, over 40% said that corruption was a serious problem in Kazakhstan and 34% said it was getting worse.

(News report from Issue No. 163, published on Dec. 4 2013)