Ukraine is awaiting an extradition request from Uzbekistan for Akbar Abdullaev, a nephew of late Uzbek President Islam Karimov. Abdullaev is accused of money laundering, corruption, and the embezzlement of state funds.
A Kyiv court ordered that Abdullaev remain in custody until Feb. 22 following his arrest on arriving at an airport in Kyiv on Jan. 14.
Abdullaev’s lawyers expect the official extradition request will come in the next few weeks, and say they can prove that Ukraine shouldn’t send him back to Uzbekistan. They say their client risks being subjected to political persecution and torture in his homeland, and point to the country’s abysmal record on human rights.
“The Ukrainian authorities have to take into consideration that Ukraine is a signatory of the European Convention of Human Rights, and Abdullaev’s extradition would violate it,” attorney Oliver Wallasch told the Kyiv Post on Feb. 3. “We’re absolutely sure that he won’t see a fair trial in his home country.”
Abdullaev arrived at Zhulyany airport in Kyiv on Jan. 14 in his personal jet and presented border officials a passport of the Dominican Republic, according to Nadezhda Maksimets, the head of the press service of Kyiv Prosecutor’s Office.
Citizens of the Dominican Republic are required a visa to enter Ukraine, which Abdullaev didn’t have.
“When the checkpoint officers began filing a protocol on an administrative offense due to the absence of a visa, he presented another passport, of Uzbekistan,” Maksimets told the media. “Later it was established that the man is on the international wanted list, on suspicion of multi-million financial fraud.”
Solomyansky District Court in Kyiv on Jan. 16 ordered that Abdullaev be held in custody for 40 days, until Uzbekistan officially requests his extradition.
“He was placed in custody considering the gravity of the indictment against him and according to the bilateral agreement between Ukraine and Uzbekistan on providing legal assistance in civil and criminal cases,” prosecutor Oleksandr Marunenko told the Kyiv Post.
Abdullaev’s lawyers have filed an appeal at Kyiv Court of Appeal claiming that Abdullaev should be released from prison. The hearing of the appeal is scheduled for Feb. 6.
Official charges
According to the Solomyansky District Court documents, The Prosecutor General’s Office of Uzbekistan opened a criminal case against the 33-year-old Abdullaev on Nov. 15.
The court statement reads that Abdullaev is accused of illegally acquiring public funds worth 262.5 billion Uzbek sums ($91 million), concealment of foreign currency worth $195.3 million and 271,602 euros ($291,400), and laundering of 77.4 million Swiss francs ($77.2 million) and 200,000 Latvian lats ($302,900).
Abdullaev already has previous convictions. In 2014 he was sentenced to 15 years in prison for embezzlement, corruption and the illegal acquisition of public funds. However, after obtaining three reductions to his sentence he was released at the end of August, just days before the death of his uncle, the former Uzbek President Islam Karimov.
Abdullaev left Uzbekistan on Oct. 14, and in his absence, Uzbek authorities opened a new criminal case against him and requested a red notice from the Interpol General Secretariat.
Political persecution?
The director of RFE/RL’s Uzbek service Alisher Sidik said in an interview with RFE/RL’s CurrentTime.tv program on Jan. 20 that Abdullaev’s case may be the highest-profile financial corruption case in the history of independent Uzbekistan.
Reportedly, Abdullaev controlled industrial production in the country and was involved in Uzbek elite’s corrupt schemes in Europe. Journalistic investigations also linked him to the late Karimov’s eldest daughter Gulnara, at one time the most powerful woman in Uzbekistan, who has been accused of financial corruption by Switzerland, the Netherlands, the United States, and Sweden, and who is now thought to be under house arrest in Tashkent.
Michele Sciurba, a researcher who works with Abdullaev’s attorney Wallasch, believes that the prosecution is purely politically motivated and that a lot of the evidence against Abdullaev has been fabricated. Besides the many questions regarding the veracity of the old and new charges against him, Sciurba said they have reasons to doubt the legitimacy of his arrest in Kyiv.
“Abdullaev has a court statement proving that he has served his sentence and was officially released from the prison. Interpol wasn’t informed of it,” Sciurba told the Kyiv Post on Feb. 2.
Sciurba speculates that after the death of Karimov, the new Uzbek administration is seeking ways to access the Uzbek elite’s frozen assets in Europe, which is by various estimates worth $1 billion.
Abdullaev’s lawyers say they are currently focusing on preventing his extradition from Ukraine to Uzbekistan and releasing him from temporary custody.
