Mukhtar Ablyazov, a fugitive former Kazakh banker and political activist, has won his appeal against a decision by a French court to extradite him to Russia. France's Court of Cassation on Wednesday upheld Mr Ablyazov's appeal against the ruling reached by a court in Aix-en-Provence in January and ordered the case to be heard again, assigning it to a court in Lyon. A defence lawyer said it was a "significant victory" for Mr Ablyazov.Mr Ablyazov, former chairman and major shareholder of Kazakhstan's BTA Bank, was arrested in France last July after spending more than a year in hiding while being pursued by the bank and the government of Kazakhstan for fraud allegedly amounting to more than $6bn. Authorities in Russia anlyond Ukraine both sought to extradite Mr Ablyazov from France to face charges of fraud related to BTA Bank, which was nationalised by Kazakhstan in 2009.
A former energy minister, Mr Ablyazov denies accusations of fraud and accuses Nursultan Nazarbayev, president of Kazakhstan, of pursuing a political vendetta against him for his opposition activities and taking over his bank illegally. The UK granted Mr Ablyazov political asylum in 2011 but he fled the country after he was sentenced to jail for contempt of court relating to fraud cases in the High Court in London involving BTA.
The Court of Cassation in Paris has not yet issued the motivations for its ruling, which is not based on the merits of the case but whether due legal processes have been followed.
Mr Ablyazov's French lawyers, led by Jean-Pierre Mignard, said they had submitted a complaint to Christiane Taubira, justice minister, calling for an investigation into what they called "apparent multiple, grave and repeated breaches" of due process allegedly committed by the judges and prosecutor in Aix-en-Provence, as reported by Le Canard Enchaîné, a French newspaper, on Wednesday.
French justice has joined British justice in acknowledging the massive frauds committed by Mr Ablyazov to the prejudice of the bank - BTA
His lawyers disputed BTA's assertion that French justice "is acknowledging the massive frauds committed" by the former banker. The lawyers said the lower court in Aix-en-Provence had only given credence to allegations by Russia and Ukraine against Mr Ablyazov, and that anyway its ruling had been overturned by the Court of Cassation.
"The speed with which the Cassation Court issued this decision today . . . shows how fundamentally and patently flawed the lower court's decision was," Mr Ablyazov's defence team said.
In January BTA Bank welcomed the lower court's decision to extradite Mr Ablyazov for trial, saying the ruling would assist the bank in its recovery efforts and demonstrated that his attempts to portray himself as a political victim were groundless.
BTA Bank said in a statement that it was disappointed by the delays caused by what it called an "administrative error" made by the court in Aix-en-Provence.
"We understand that according to the decision of the French Supreme Court, such annulment resulted solely and exclusively from an administrative error by the court in the extradition process in failing to have Mr Ablyazov sign an official record before the court objecting again to the extradition requests following a minor change in the composition of the court," BTA said.
"French justice has joined British justice in acknowledging the massive frauds committed by Mr Ablyazov to the prejudice of the bank," BTA said. It said it understood that Mr Ablyazov would remain in custody until the Lyon court makes its decision on whether to hold a retrial and that BTA was confident the ruling would confirm his extradition.
BTA said that so far it had secured numerous judgments in the English High Court in its favour for nearly $4bn and was in the process of seeking to enforce those judgments against assets currently held in receivership.
Legal representatives for Russia had no immediate comment.
FT.com
