“There will be no festivities on my birthday,” Kazakhstan’s president told administrators in March. “That’s an order.”
By Praveen Swami, Diplomatic Editor 8:00AM GMT 01 Dec 2010“There will be no festivities on my birthday,” Kazakhstan’s president told administrators in March. “That’s an order.”Perhaps it was – but on a summer night in June, hundreds of dignitaries from around the gathered in the Norman Foster-designed Khan Shatyry entertainment centre in Astana to celebrate Nursultan Nazarbayev’s 70th birthday – his 19th in office as Kazakhstan’s unquestioned ruler.Folk performers, dancers and opera singers entertained the president’s guests.Later this week, world rulers will be gathering again, this time for a summit of the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) – under Mr Nazarbayev’s chairmanship.Mr Nazarabayev, the son of a shepherd who started life as a steelworker, has come a long way.
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Pro-democracy protesters have been seized in Kazakhstan, as a campaign to keep Nursultan Nazarbayev, the president, in power for another decade without elections claimed the support of more than half the country’s voters.
Tensions have risen after Mukhtar Ablyazov, the founder of the Democratic Choice party that campaigns for economic and political reform in Kazakhstan, fled to Britain claiming that he was the victim of persecution by the country’s ruler, President Nursultan Nazarbayev.Mr Ablyazov, a banker and free market advocate, claims he was tortured after being jailed for six years and has applied to the Home Office for political asylum. The Kazakh authorities have rejected Mr Ablyazov’s allegations and accused him of defrauding the state-owned BTA bank of an estimated £185 million.The Kazakhs are lobbying Foreign Office ministers not to grant him asylum, which they say could jeopardise Britain’s ties with Kazakhstan.The Foreign Office regards Kazakhstan’s support for the Afghan military campaign as important.
Its role has assumed greater significance following the unrest in neighbouring Kyrgyzstan, the location of a key Nato airbase used to supply troops in Afghanistan.But it is Britain’s trade ties with Kazakhstan that most concerns ministers. Its vast, untapped energy and mineral reserves means that Britain is among the country’s top five investors. Its burgeoning wealth was recently illustrated when the president’s son-in-law bought Prince Andrew’s Sunninghill Park estate near Ascot, Berkshire, for £15 million, £3 million above the asking price.
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Fugitive Kazakh banker Mukhtar Ablyazov has vowed to continue publishing documents implicating Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbaev’s son-in-law, Timur Kulibaev, has been involved in corrupt business deals, RFE/RL’s Kazakh Service reports.
On February 1, Kazakh officials impounded the editions of five opposition and independent newspapers that contain a statement by Ablyazov alleging serious corruption by Kulibaev.
Ablyazov told RFE/RL in an exclusive interview he was aware of a defamation lawsuit filed by Kulibaev against him and the newspapers but that it wouldn’t deter him.
An Almaty district court ordered the seizure of the newspapers after Kulibaev filed the lawsuit against the publications “Respublika,” “Golos Respubliki” (Voice of the Republic), “Vzglyad” (Glance), “Kursiv,” and “Kursiv-News.”
Ablyazov alleged in the newspapers that Kulibaev illegally obtained tens of millions of dollars in a deal with Chinese National Petroleum Corporation several years ago.
Ablyazov left Kazakhstan for London in 2009 after his BTA Bank was taken over by the government.
Presidential son-in-law Timur KulibaevHe says there is a positive side to Kulibaev’s lawsuit against him. “Since this is a civil case, the trial should be open, and if it is open I am ready to prove every word of mine with documents and other materials I have,” he said.
Ablyazov said this is also a good opportunity to check if Nazarbaev was sincere when he said publicly several times that his children and other relatives are not special and are like all citizens of Kazakhstan.
He said he intends to make several more public statements via the Internet and independent media in the near future.
Ablyazov said a group of businessmen approached him recently seeking some documents I have “so that they could file lawsuits against Kulibaev, and I am ready to help them.” He said the time has come for Kazakhstan’s business community to clear up some issues with Nazarbaev’s second son-in-law.
Kulibaev is an executive in many of Kazakhstan’s energy-related businesses and the husband of Nazarbaev’s second daughter, Dinara.
http://www.rferl.org/content/Fugitive_Kazakh_To_Press_Case_Against_Nazarbaevs_SonInLaw/1949105.html
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ALMATY (Reuters) — A banker and former opposition leader, who fled Kazakhstan after his bank was nationalized, has described fraud allegations against him as a politically motivated attempt to discredit him.
Mukhtar Ablyazov, who has been an outspoken critic of President Nursultan Nazarbaev and was jailed for a year in 2002, was sacked as chairman of top Kazakh bank BTA in February after the government took over most of its shares to prevent its collapse.
Ablyazov, 45, has since left Kazakhstan, joining a handful of Kazakh politicians who have gone into self-imposed exile in recent years after falling out with the authorities. This week prosecutors accused Ablyazov of money laundering and fraud.
“These allegations are baseless and politically motivated. …This is no more than a crude attempt by the government to discredit anyone, who dares to stand up to them,” he said in a statement e-mailed to Reuters by his representative in Britain.
“It was completely predictable that, having engineered the seizure of BTA Bank, the government would seek to give legitimacy to its actions by launching bogus criminal charges against me and other BTA executives,” the statement continued.
Last week Ablyazov’s cousin lost her job as a member of BTA’s board of directors, BTA said in a statement. The Ablyazov case comes at a time of a deepening financial crisis, which has sharpened divisions among Kazakhstan’s political elite and crippled its once-robust economic growth.
Recession has made people more critical of the government, prompting the opposition to hold a string of small rallies since the start of the year.
The government has denied the Ablyazov case is politically motivated.
Ablyazov’s representative refused to reveal his whereabouts.
A founder of a big Kazakh opposition party, Ablyazov was jailed for a year in 2002 on corruption charges. At the time he said that case was politically motivated, and accused Nazarbaev of trying to silence dissent.
Eventually pardoned, Ablyazov mended bridges with Nazarbaev and became chairman of BTA, which was once one of the country’s most successful banks, but which has been hit hard by the crisis.
Nazarbaev has ruled Kazakhstan with an iron fist since 1989, but has been widely popular because of rising incomes and a booming oil-producing economy.
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