What is not in dispute is that, even by the loose standards of the credit boom, few banks lent as aggressively as BTA. Between 2003 and 2007, the amount of its loans outstanding grew by an extraordinary 1,100 percent. Like many other banks in less developed countries, BTA relied heavily on foreign funds, as opposed to customer deposits, to propel its loan growth — so much so that its ratio of loans to deposits peaked at 3.6 to 1 in 2007, one of the highest anywhere in the world.
Mr. Ablyazov maintains that BTA would have paid off its loans had he remained at the helm and that the enormous charge-off was a ploy by Mr. Nazarbayev to seize control of BTA and damage a political rival's reputation.
Lawyers and BTA executives contend that many of the offshore companies were controlled by Mr. Ablyazov, and BTA lawyers are now trying to determine whether the loans were used to provide billions of dollars to Mr. Ablyazov's own real estate projects — in particular, a 4,700-acre development outside Moscow in which BTA has a $1.5 billion credit exposure.
Although his title was chairman, Mr. Ablyazov took a hands-on approach when it came to the bank's lending, even sitting on the regional credit committee that oversaw many of the questionable loans.
In its 2008 report on BTA, Ernst & Young, the bank's auditor, highlighted this unusual arrangement, citing it as a conflict of interest that "potentially contributed to the issuance of loans to offshore companies, which became uncollectible in 2008."
Mr. Ablyazov disputes this claim, saying that he had headed this committee for three years without complaint from his auditor, and that the bank's credit operations were transparent.
Nikolay Varenko, the deputy chairman of BTA and the executive leading the bank's internal investigation into Mr. Ablyazov's activities, disagrees.
"The bank was like an investment fund for his own personal projects," he said.
For Mr. Ablyazov, the question of how he deployed BTA's loan book is just the latest in a series of battles he has been waging with President Nazarbayev.
And while he may well have his enemies, few question his bravery.
In 2001, he and several other reform-minded businessmen founded the Democratic Choice of Kazakhstan Party, the first opposition party to challenge Mr. Nazarbayev on the ground that he and his network of family insiders were monopolizing economic and political power.
A year later, he was sentenced to six years behind bars on charges related to his time as head of the government electricity company. Mr. Ablyazov claims the charges were politically motivated. He served a little over a year in Kazakhstan prison, where he says he was subjected to numerous beatings and other forms of torture.
After pressure from international human rights organizations, Mr. Ablyazov was released in 2003. In 2005 he took full control of BTA.
These days, he rents a 15,000-square-foot mansion on Bishops Avenue in London, one of London's most exclusive neighborhoods, where security guards stand day and night.
Unlike other oligarchs here, Mr. Ablyazov keeps a low profile in London. He says that his ultimate aim is to overthrow Mr. Nazarbayev, even though he could be caught up in British courts for years to come.
"I am just here temporarily," he insisted. "In the end I will return to Kazakhstan."
The New York Times
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