Another case against Gulnora Karimova sent to court
TASHKENT. Jan 6 (Interfax) - Uzbekistan's Prosecutor General's Office has completed the investigation into the new criminal case against Gulnora Karimova, elder daughter of the republic's ex-president, the agency said on Telegram on Monday.
"The Prosecutor General's Office has completed the investigation into the criminal case against Gulnora Karimova and other persons, who committed as members of a criminal community crimes associated with extortion, embezzlement of public funds and money laundering in foreign countries," the report said.
The case and the indictment have been sent to court to be heard on its merits, the agency said.
It was reported in August 2019 that the Uzbek Prosecutor General's Office had opened criminal cases against Karimova based on situations of embezzlement of state funds and signing deals contradicting the republic's interests.
Karimova was convicted for extortion and tax evasion in August 2015. She is also implicated in another criminal case on a number of other charges and she was sentenced to ten years in prison on December 18, 2019 in a criminal case. However, "manifesting humanity and taking into account the obligations assumed by the convict to repay the money obtained using criminal methods and compensate for the damage done to the state," the court replaced her punishment with five years of freedom restriction on July 1, 2018.
Karimova chose to serve her sentence in the place where her daughter Iman lives. Several restrictions were imposed on the convict, "including not to leave her residence, not to use communications and the Internet, and also compensate for the damage."
The Uzbek Prosecutor General's Office said in early March 2019 she had been transferred to a general-security penal colony to serve the rest of her term there due to systematic violations of the obligations established by court.
It was reported earlier that Gulnora Karimova had been convicted of extortion and tax evasion in August 2015 and that the overall damage her actions caused to Uzbekistan was valued at nearly $2 billion. Uzbekistan initiated the seizure of the group's assets in 12 countries, including in Russia, worth over $1.5 billion.
The U.S. Department of the Treasury put Karimova on its sanction list under the Global Magnitsky Human Rights Accountability Act in December 2017. The Treasury concluded that she "headed a powerful organized crime syndicate that leveraged state actors to expropriate businesses, monopolize markets, solicit bribes, and administer extortion rackets."