Azerbaijan embroiled in allegations of secret £2.2bn slush fund

Azerbaijan OCCRP
Azerbaijan ran $3bn slush fund to pay off European politicians, says OCCRP
Author

06 September, 2017

British prime minister Theresa May's spokesperson said that the National Crime Agency would now examine the information.

Azerbaijan's government has not yet commented on the allegations.

Azerbaijan's leadership, which has been accused of multiple human rights abuses, the rigging of elections and widespread corruption, is said to have used the companies to disguise the source of thousands of payments made to officials and journalists in other countries who have portrayed the oil-rich nation in a positive light. "The financial system should effectively and efficiently provide investment that benefits the whole economy, not boost the offshore bank balances of plutocrats and criminals here and abroad". Among the recipients of payments were Luca Volonte, a former Italian EMP who is now on trial for accepting bribes from Baku in exchange for favourable decisions at the Council of Europe; Kalin Mitrev, a Bulgarian who is on the board of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development and is married to UNESCO's director general, Irina Bokova; Eduard Litner, a German ex-MP; Eckart Sager, a London-based former CNN producer; and Jovdat Guliyev, a London-based Azerbaijani citizen who is a member of the Anglo Azerbaijani Society, a lobbying group. Guliyev received almost £400,000 from the scheme. The society's co-chair, Lord German, said Guliyev quit nine minutes after the Guardian's story went online.

"When has The Guardian written the truth about Azerbaijan? This newspaper has been known for decades for being against Azerbaijan", Hasanov told the Turkish newspaper Hürriyet.

The presidential press office, however, said the project was the work of George Soros and those working for the billionaire American philanthropist.

The authors of the report said that the extent of the scheme's use was likely to evolve further as investigations continue.

The scheme has been nicknamed the Azerbaijani Laundromat.

The money was allegedly channelled through four UK-based opaque companies.

According to the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP), which published the results an investigation dubbed the Azerbaijani Laundromat, funds which passed through the companies made their way to various countries including Germany, France, Turkey, Iran and Kazakhstan.

The money would have been transferred with the help of some United Kingdom front companies but there are no suggestions that all the recipients were aware of the origin of the financial route.

Some of this money went to politicians and journalists, as part of an global lobbying operation to deflect criticism of Azerbaijan's president Ilham Aliyev, and to promote a positive image of his oil-rich country.


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