Uzbekistan is filing criminal charges against the eldest daughter of the country’s late long-time dictator for stealing around $2bn, revealing her whereabouts after she vanished from public view nearly four years ago.
The general prosecutor’s office said Friday in a statement that Gulnara Karimova – whose father Islam ruled the Central Asian country from the collapse of the USSR until his death last year – had been sentenced to five years in prison in 2015 on charges including tax evasion, embezzlement, and illegally appropriating state assets. Ms Karimova also faces six separate fraud charges.
In total, the prosecutor’s office said Ms Karimova and her associates had stolen $1.6bn, €26m, and 1.27tn Uzbek som ($311m). Uzbekistan is appealing to 12 countries including the UK, France, Switzerland, and Russia to return the assets, which it said are kept mostly in cash and property.
Ms Karimova was believed to have been held under house arrest since 2014, when her Twitter postings abruptly stopped. A UK public relations firm hired by her son released photos indicating that she was under house arrest.
Ms Karimova is also facing investigations in the US and several European countries since the Department of Justice placed a $1bn freeze order on her foreign assets in 2015 over bribes she allegedly accepted from telecom companies. Veon, the mobile operator formerly known as Vimpelcom, paid a $795m fine last year after admitting paying bribes to Ms Karimova. Telia said last year it had set aside $1.45bn for a possible settlement.
A Swiss lawyer said in January that he visited Ms Karimova in December as part of that country’s investigation into a SFr800m money laundering investigation. The reported meeting was the first indication that Ms Karimova was alive since her disappearance.
The charges underscore Ms Karimova’s downfall after a power play widely believed to have been orchestrated by her younger sister Lola. During her father’s reign, which saw Uzbekistan become one of the world’s most secretive and repressive countries, Ms Karimova took on roles including telecoms baron, Uzbekistan’s ambassador to the UN, fashion designer, and pop star – even duetting with French actor Gerard Depardieu.
A US diplomatic cable released by Wikileaks in 2010 called Ms Karimova a “robber baron” and “greedy, power-hungry individual” whose corrupt appetites had made her “the most hated person in the country.”