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France extradites Kazakh dissident Mukhtar Ablyazov to Russia

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Mukhtar-Ablyazov-007The Open Dialog Foundation (ODF) has signalled the latest worrying developments in the case of Mukhtar Ablyazov , Kazakh dissident and the main politicial opponent to Kazakhstan President Nursultan Nazarbayev.

On 17 September, French Prime Minister Manuel Valls signed an extradition decree in 

Ablyazov's lawyers announced an appeal to the French Council of State. You can find here the ODF's statement on the decision of the French authorities, containing comments made by Open Dialog Foundation President Lyudmyla Kozlovska and Yevgeny Zhovtis, renowned Kazakh lawyer and human-rights defender. The Open Dialog Foundation calls on the international community to react strongly and to appeal to the French authorities not to send the Kazakh dissident to Russia. As learned from experience, especially when bilateral ties and economic interests are at stake, this is often the only way to ensure that values and human rights prevail.

The Open Dialog Foundation urges the French authorities to consider the broader context of the case, to analyse its political background carefully and to stop the extradition procedure in order to ensure the safety of the Kazakh dissident and to send a message to Russia that its serial abuses of human rights mean that until there are drastic improvements in Russia, Paris will no longer trust Moscow when it comes to such matters.

Background
Ablyazov is a businessman. Before 2001, he was a member of the Kazakh government. In 2001 Ablyazov co-founded the Democratic Choice of Kazakhstan (later Alga) opposition political party. He was also financing and supporting the opposition media and civil society movements in Kazakhstan. After the forcible nationalisation of the BTA Bank, in 2009, Ablyazov fled from Kazakhstan and was granted political asylum in the UK, in 2011. In July 2013 Ablyazov was arrested in France upon request issued to the INTERPOL by both Russian and Ukrainian authorities. Since that time his extradition process has been taking place in France. Kazakh authorities, along with its Russian and Ukrainian counterparts accuse Ablyazov of the embezzlement of $6 billion, during the time he was charing the BTA Bank.

Russian and Ukrainian investigators involved in Mr Ablyazov's case are responsible for other politically motivated cases in these countries. Investigator, Mr Nikolay Budilo was responsible for Sergei Magnitsky's case in Russia, while prosecutor Mr Viktor Grin; judges Mr Sergey Podoprigorov, Ms Elena Stashina, Mr Alexey Krivoruchko and Ms Svetlana Ukhnaleva, and investigator Mr Maksim Melnyk were responsible for EuroMaidan's cases in Ukraine.

Ablyazov's case has been broadly recognized as politically motivated by the international community (including many politicians - MPs, MEPs and human rights defenders - Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, FIDH, ACAT and other NGOs). Countries like the Czech Republic, Italy, Poland, Spain, the UK, and other gave political asylum, refugee status or other kind of international protection to associates and family members of Ablyazov.

The list of supporters in the case may be found here.

Involvement of the Open Dialog Foundation

The Open Dialog Foundation as an organization which works widely on human rights situation in Kazakhstan, and which supports Kazakh political opposition and civil society, follows the case of Ablyazov since May 2013, when his wife, Alma Shalabayeva was illegally deported from Italy to Kazakhstan. Since that time, we have produced several reports and statements on the case. Here, you can find our main report (October 2014), here a publication on the illegal involvement of the Ukrainian authorities (March 2015), and here and here reports with arguments against the extradition to Russia and Ukraine (i.e. risk of sending back to Kazakhstan; no fair trial; bad conditions of detention; risk of tortures; involvement of corrupted judiciary and illegal links between Kazakh and Russian, Ukrainian and French authorities) (May 2015 and September 2015).

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