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Eurasia
March 16, 2018 www.intellinews.com I Page 20
financial mismanagement and embezzlement. Ablyazov reportedly described the trial as a farce. According to the charges, Ablyazov allegedly stole pension assets and personal savings as well as loans received from foreign financial institutions, causing damages estimated at $7.5bn.
Ablyazov initially fled Kazakhstan for the UK where he was granted political asylum. After a British court issued an order to arrest him for contempt of court, he then fled to France. In 2013, Ablyazov was arrested in France after 18 months in hiding. He was released from jail on December 9 last year after the highest French administrative court can- celled an order for his extradition to Russia. That move was made based on Ablyazov’s claims that the whole case against him is politically motivated.
An extradition to Russia would mean he would be immediately surrendered to Kazakhstan, Ablyazov has claimed.
Uzbek president reaffirms support for Tajikistan's $3.9bn Rogun hydropower project
bne IntelliNews
Uzbekistan has officially reaffirmed that it no longer holds objections to the construction of
the Rogun hydropower dam in Tajikistan, the presidents of the two countries indicated during Uzbek President Shavkat Mirziyoyev’s first official visit to neighbouring Tajikistan on March 9.
Mirziyoyev has previously unofficially put a stop to conflicts between Uzbekistan and Tajikistan over the latter's intention to construct the dam,
While in exile, Ablyazov has been a vocal critic of President Nazarbayev’s regime. He has alleged that the Kazakh authorities’ accusations are part of a vendetta against him for trangressing against Nazarbayev by breaking a code of trust between the Kazakh oligarchs. Prior to falling out of favour with Kazakhstan’s regime, Ablyazov briefly led an opposition movement against Nazarbayev in 2002 before re-aligning himself with the regime.
Turning against Nazarbayev once again, this time in Europe, Ablyazov earned himself a number
of supporters, including human rights activists and Kazakh dissidents. His allies argue that the supposed diversion of money by Ablyazov, even if it were potentially true, would only show that he played by the rules of the Kazakh oligarchs and that he now poses a threat to the regime due to the insider secrets he gained by partaking in the kleptocracy.
President Shavkat Mirziyoyev
which his long-ruling predecessor Islam Karimov feared would cut off water for irrigation in Uzbek agriculture. This occasion, however, marks the first official recognition that hostilities over the dam have been ended by both leaders.
Rogun is to be a 3,600MW hydropower investment, complete with the world's tallest dam structure. The project is meant to end Tajikistan's winter energy shortages as well as support the country's