ICIJ journalists found offshore companies of Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev to hide shares in gold mines and London real estate

President of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev (Photo: Actionpress/TASS)

Relatives of Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev used funds and companies registered in Panama to hide shares in gold mining companies and London real estate. This is stated in a press release published on Sunday by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalism (ICIJ) .

The consortium obtained documents from the Panamanian law firm Mossack Fonseca , suspected of creating shell companies and corporate structures to hide the owners of assets. The press release does not specify the ownership structure of the Aliyev family, but the Azerbaijani leader already came to the attention of ICIJ three years ago. Then investigators convicted him and his family of owning secret offshore companies.

According to documents obtained by ICIJ, Aliyev and his wife Mehriban acquired Rosamund International Ltd in the British Virgin Islands in 2003. Aliyev, who was listed as the director and co-owner of the company, was at that time a member of parliament, and in October of the same year became president. According to ICIJ, the company had legal legal status until May 2004. Aliyev thus violated legislation prohibiting members of parliament and the president from engaging in business, lawyers interviewed by ICIJ clarified.

In 2008, according to ICIJ, Aliyev’s daughters, 19-year-old Arzu and 23-year-old Leyla, acquired Arbor Investments, LaBelleza Holdings Limited and Harvard Management Limited in the same British Virgin Islands. The first one was allegedly registered to Arzu, the rest - to Leyla. The deal was concluded two months after Aliyev was re-elected as president.

At that time, ICIJ could not name the type of activity of all these companies, but clarified that the leadership of Azerbaijan, apparently, made considerable efforts to hide their existence from the public.

ICIJ named Azerbaijani entrepreneur Hasan Gozal as the head of all three companies. According to the organization, Gozal, along with his brother Abdolbari, owned at least ten companies that were part of the Intersun holding, where Abdolbari was president and Hasan was vice president. According to documents obtained by ICIJ, Intersun received several large contracts from the state oil company of Azerbaijan, where Aliyev was first vice president before being elected head of state. In addition, companies owned by the Gozal brothers won government contracts for construction in Baku and beyond for a total of $4.5 billion.

The media found gold mining companies of the President of Azerbaijan in offshores