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Greetings From Amsterdam,
Promises to end government corruption led one Armenian politician to the heights of power. In this edition of OCCRP Weekly, we’ll unpack how a government program he oversaw then benefited his family.
With the first week of the COP29 climate conference underway, we’re also continuing our coverage of conflicts of interest in the host country of Azerbaijan. Plus, internal documents from inside the notorious Estonian branch of Swedbank reveal that staff openly joked about opening and managing dirty accounts — and accepting gifts and bribes from customers to do so; a Colombian court quickly folds on years-long animal trafficking charges against the son of a drug lord; Turkish authorities celebrate the bust of a major crime ring; and more.
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Armenia’s Former Deputy PM Oversaw Project That Benefited His Family Company
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In 2018, Armenia’s “Velvet Revolution” catapulted a young Yerevan city council member named Tigran Avinyan to the role of deputy prime minister as part of a new government vowing to eradicate corruption.
Avinyan, who was just 29 at the time, was tasked with overseeing government projects related to economic development, technology, and infrastructure. His work included coordinating agricultural programs that doled out millions of dollars in subsidies to support companies setting up intensively cultivated orchards across the country.
Nine recipients of those state funds then subcontracted work to Avinyan’s family company. That includes five that received about $620,000 in direct payments and another four that benefited from subsidies on loan interest rates.
Avinyan founded Irrigate LLC in 2011 and transferred the company to his brother and father shortly after he was appointed deputy prime minister. It’s unclear exactly how much money Irrigate received. But two of the companies that subcontracted work to it ranked as the second and third largest recipients of direct payments overall. What’s more, tax records indicate that business soared for Irrigate after Avinyan took office: Its average annual tax payments rose from the equivalent of $3,800 prior to the Velvet Revolution to $48,000 afterward.
Reporters did not find evidence of misconduct in awarding contracts, and companies that subcontracted Irrigate attributed the decision to the company’s quality of work — or chance. Irrigate and Avinyan’s family did not respond to reporter inquiries.
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Azerbaijan's COP29 Organizers Criticized For Oil Ties, Other Potential Conflicts of Interest
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The most important climate conference of the year kicked off in Azerbaijan earlier this week, with world leaders gathering to negotiate how to tackle global warming. They’re joined at the table with at least four officials with deep ties to the host country’s state oil company, SOCAR — and all of whom play major roles in the summit.
Azerbaijan President Ilham Aliyev, who said earlier this year that the country’s oil reserves were “a gift from God,” appointed both SOCAR’s president and its chairman as members of the committee overseeing the event’s logistical arrangements and cooperation with international partners.
As the “president” of this year’s event, Azerbaijan also has a smaller team charged with leading the conference and a vision for its “best possible outcome.” Aliyev installed a former SOCAR executive as chief executive officer, and Azerbaijan’s deputy energy minister, Elnur Soltanov, who doubles as a member of the SOCAR board.
In other words, officials with an interest in expanding fossil fuels are guiding the climate talks.
None of these officials responded to requests for comment, including Aliyev, who is a former SOCAR executive himself.
Their roles at COP29 underscore a lack of guardrails by the United Nations against corporate and fossil fuel influence by host countries to the annual event, or measures to get host countries or delegates to disclose their conflicts of interest.
Transparency International and the Anti-Corruption Data Collective have raised concerns that SOCAR might use the conference to “greenwash” its activities and promote fossil fuel production. Last week, the BBC reported that Soltanov was secretly filmed appearing to use his position to discuss oil deals.
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Earlier this week, OCCRP senior editor Ilya Lozovsky spoke with Philippine media outlet Rappler about our recent reporting linking President Aliyev’s family and inner circle to COP29’s official partners. Lozovsky explained why we are continuing to focus on Azerbaijani journalists who have been jailed for bringing similar issues to light:
“You can't ignore a country just because you don't like the government or you think it's not democratic. But on the other hand, we have to point out that people in Azerbaijan are in prison or in exile just for speaking the truth and trying to report the truth.”
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Months After Estonia Drops Swedbank Case, Trove of Office Memos Show Laundering Was Open Joke
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Swedbank Estonia staff say they want to put the events of 10 years ago behind them. Since 2019, the bank has been embroiled in investigations over the use of Swedbank accounts to move millions of dollars out of Russia through an intricate network of offshore companies. The bank’s CEO was convicted of misleading the public and shareholders about money-laundering risks, but prosecutions in Estonia fell flat early this year without input from Russian authorities.
Now, 300 redacted files, internal emails, chats, and memos released by the Estonian public prosecutor’s office to OCCRP partner Delfi Estonia reveal that money laundering was a joke among the Swedbank staff responsible for courting new clients.
Client managers, who were often first to meet new customers and whose careers relied on accommodating their needs, openly quipped about opening and managing dirty accounts in exchange for bribes like cash, watches, and cognac:
“I wouldn’t even have opened that account, but the guy brought a decent bottle of Hennessy XO,” one Swedbank Estonia client manager said to a colleague via email in 2014.
“I’m already loving the phrase ‘clean and transparent money laundering,’” another wrote in an internal message.
One described a former colleague as “up to his elbows in the washing machine.”
Past reporting reveals how “high-risk, non-resident” companies largely controlled by Russian oligarchs helped Swedbank produce more than 100 billion euros in turnover between 2008 and 2018 and rise to become the largest bank in Estonia. Prosecutorial evidence against Swedbank was previously unavailable to journalists.
Swedbank Estonia declined to comment on the contents of the records, but the court investigation, its representatives said, was closed because “there was no crime.”
Read the full story 
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In Colombia, Fernando Rodríguez Mondragón, the son of a notorious drug lord, was released by a court just two months after he was issued a four-year prison sentence for trafficking shark parts. His original fine of $58,000 was similarly reduced to $311 — which was attributed to his cooperation with prosecutors and otherwise clean record in recent years.
The case surrounds Colombian authorities’ 2021 seizure of a shipment of about 3,500 shark fins en route to Hong Kong just six months after Colombia banned the fishing and trade of sharks and shark parts. Rodríguez Mondragón has denied wrongdoing, but admitted to owning the company involved in the shipment. Prosecutors said he provided critical information about the smuggling of shark fins to China through Colombian ports.
The family of Hennadiy Kasai, a Ukrainian member of parliament, secretly acquired over $1 million in Dubai real estate even as Russia’s war in Ukraine ramped up. The purchase of four apartments in 2022 and 2023 by Kasai’s daughter Polina and his nephew Oleksandr came as a company co-owned by Oleksandr faced allegations of supplying poor-quality military uniforms to the government at three times the market value.
Two Defense Ministry officials were charged for their involvement in the deal and a co-owner of the company was indicted but fled the country. Oleksandr Kasai left Ukraine before charges were issued, in violation of martial law restricting Ukrainian men aged 18 to 60 from leaving the country. Neither he nor Polina Kasai responded to questions; financial records indicate no legitimate source of income to cover the Dubai property costs.
Turkish authorities have dismantled the major “Baygaralar” criminal network, which was allegedly behind scores of crimes, including murder, arms and drugs trafficking, aggravated fraud, robbery, and assault. In a coordinated operation of raids spanning 16 Turkish provinces, officials arrested 270 suspects and seized a cache of illegal firearms in addition to funds, digital devices, vehicles, residences, and plots of land. The sweeping operation comes after the May arrest in Greece of the group’s alleged ringleader, 29-year-old Ramazan Bayğara.
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Yesterday, the International Center for Journalists honored OCCRP Senior Middle East and North Africa Editor Rana Sabbagh and John-Allan Namu, the co-founder of our member center Africa Uncensored, with the Knight Trailblazer Award and Knight International Journalism Award, respectively, during its 40th Anniversary Awards Dinner.
Watch the clip on Sabbagh’s impactful and relentless work, which has led to over 4,000 journalists being trained, 600 investigations reported, and more than 2.3 million views on a single series. Plus, see how Namu’s fearless reporting has unveiled corruption across Kenya — including criminal rings in city governments and cartels’ control of essential services like water and electricity in local slums — and led to policy overhauls and charges against corrupt officials.
More from OCCRP next week.
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