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pursuing criminal bribery and other charges against the Finnish-Swedish telecom company formerly known as TeliaSonera, now named Telia. They include a September 2012 affidavit
by one of Karimova’s closest business associates, Bekhzod Akhmedov, who was a senior executive at Uzdunrobita.
In his 17-page affidavit – given to an investigator with the Russian Interior Ministry's organised crime unit in Moscow in 2012 three months after he had fled Uzbekistan allegedly fearing for his life – Akhmedov reportedly asserts that Karimova and an aide issued explicit or implied threats against him and his family, pressured him to provide hundreds of thousands of dollars for a Karimova-foundation event and even pushed him to sell a family home to obtain demanded cash, while reminding him that "every dollar of your property belongs to me."
Karimova introduced to US investors
Karimova essentially controlled Uzdun- robita, founded by US investors after the demise of the Soviet Union, through a series of shell companies from 2002.
Asia's most populous country, drawing the attention of Russia's largest telecom company, MTS. It went on to take control of Uzdunrobita, but in 2014 MTS announced it was under investigation by US authorities for potential violation of US corruption laws and in 2016 it sold its Uzdunrobita stake and stated that it planned to leave Uzbekistan altogether.
Also among the allegations reported in the affidavit are a claim that in 2012 Karimova's close associate Gayane Avakyan ordered Akhmedov to come to
a gala event at the Cannes Film Festival being hosted by Monaco's Prince Albert and the foundation of former US President Bill Clinton; and how in May 2012, Karimova demanded Akhmedov's wife and children return to Tashkent from Russia, and that their apartment in Moscow be sold to pay off alleged debts.
On September 25, the Swedish Prosecu- tion Authority said that three former employees at Telia, including ex-chief executive Lars Nyberg, were to be charged in connection with the ongoing Uzbek bribery case. Three days earlier,
it was announced by US prosecutors
that Telia and Uzbek subsidiary Coscom LLC, had agreed to pay a global foreign bribery penalty amounting to $965mn to resolve charges related to hundreds of millions of dollars in bribes paid out to enter Uzbekistan’s mobile market.
Telia, along with Russian VimpelCom (now VEON) and MTS, were pursued by prosecutors for bribing entities connected to Karimova, to win licences to operate 3G and 4G services on the Uzbek mobile market. VimpelCom was fined $795m by US and Dutch authorities for the bribes it paid in Uzbekistan.
“In 2014 MTS announced it was under investigation by US authorities for potential violation of US corruption laws”
Akhmedov reportedly relates in his affidavit how in 2001 he introduced Karimova to Uzdunrobita's main American investors, who were seeking
a licence in Uzbekistan and wanted her to secure the involvement of her father, then-President Islam Karimov. Karimova is said to have demanded a 20% stake in Uzdunrobita, while warning there could be problems for the company.
Like many foreign investors by 2004, the US investors decided to try and exit Uzbekistan partly due to currency restrictions preventing them from repatriating Uzbek profits in American dollars. Mobile phone usage was by then expanding enormously in Central
Karimova's Tashkent office, where he was told he owed her $15mn because of claimed losses incurred by Uzdunrobita's advertising operations; how in 2012, Akhmedov received an invoice from Karimova's charitable foundation, the Fund Forum, for $250,000, to attend
Find more Eurasia content at www.bne.eu/eurasia
Selected headlines from past month:
· Azerbaijan tolerates third anti-corruption Baku protest in a month
· In apparent gain for transparency, Uzbeks report GDP growth at below 7% for
first time in decade
· India sends first Afghanistan-bound shipment via Iran’s sole oceanic port Chabahar
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