Kazakh prosecutor calls graft charges nonsense

August 4, 2000
Web posted at: 10:36 a.m. HKT (0236 GMT)

ALMATY, Kazakhstan (Reuters) -- Kazakhstan's Prosecutor-General Yury Khitrin Thursday dismissed media reports that senior officials, including President Nursultan Nazarbayev, may have accepted funds illegally channeled by a U.S. businessman.

"Any charges that our top leaders accept bribes is another piece of unsubstantiated nonsense," Khitrin told Reuters.

"There are no concrete facts in these publications, on the Internet, to back them up ... they are just slander."

Newsweek reported in its July 10 issue that the U.S. Justice Department was looking into whether businessman James Giffen had funneled cash from oil companies ExxonMobil, BP Amoco and affiliates of Phillips Petroleum Co.

A Justice Department document cited by Newsweek detailed alleged payments of $65 million by the three companies to shell companies. Of this money investigators believe $35 million went to Kazakh officials.

The report came months after Swiss investigators said they were looking into bank accounts held by the Kazakh government abroad, including one that could have belonged to Nazarbayev.

The government has not commented on the allegations but the prosecutor's office last month said Giffen had not broken any Kazakh laws and was not under investigation. Khitrin said he was not aware of any bank accounts being frozen.

Kazakhstan's privatization program after independence in 1991 saw big oil and metals companies pass into private hands but the process was criticized as lacking transparency.

Nazarbayev earlier this week called for an investigation into the accounts of large foreign and Kazakh companies, calling them tax underpayers, but economists say he and other senior officials helped the companies rise in the first place.

Khitrin said he was continuing his pursuit of former Kazakh Prime Minister Akezhan Kazhegeldin, who is wanted in Kazakhstan on charges of tax evasion and money laundering. Kazhegeldin, speaking from exile, has denied the accusations.

"I plan to fly to Belgium before September 10 to sign a bilateral agreement on cooperation and also to acquaint myself with this criminal case," Khitrin said.

"I will be accompanied by investigators who will check Kazhegeldin's accounts."

Khitrin said Belgian authorities had opened a case against Kazhegeldin for money laundering and had frozen all his assets.

The ex-prime minister, who left Kazakhstan in late 1998, was detained last month at Rome airport at Kazakhstan's request. He was later released.

"Unfortunately Kazakhstan has not yet signed the convention for extradition of criminals," Khitrin said.

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U.S. Department of Justice
Kazakhstan
CIA -- The World Factbook 1999 -- Kazakhstan

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