This video is in Russian but is pretty self-explanatory. While in Geneva we decided to look for Gulnara Karimova’s US25 million dollar home, to see how the proceeds of forced child labour are spent.
Regular readers will recall the EU Commission insisted to me there is “no reliable evidence” of what is in truth the use of millions of forced child labourers in the Uzbek state owned cotton plantations. I was also interested to see if there was any activity surrounding the large underground concrete vaults established under the rear of the garden behind Gulnara’s house three years ago at a cost of eight million dollars. I detailed in Murder in Samarkand that the Karimov’s loot Uzbekistan’s large state-owned gold industry in stealing physical gold, some of which is fenced through Gulnara’s jewellery business, but most of which is stored as collateral.
The Karimovs had lost a certain amount of faith in the Swiss banking system’s ability or willingness to protect their money in all circumstances, so have started storing the physical gold in the vaults under Gulnara’s back garden on the shores of Lake Geneva.
Their faith in the Swiss banking system was further damaged a few months ago when Gulnara’s erstwhile business partner Bekzond Akhmedov absconded with US 312 million dollars she regarded as hers but which was held in his name. Akhmedov is so hated by the Karimov’s they now even associate him with me, which is definitely the seventh circle of hell in their world-view. Hence Gulnara’s extraordinary attack on me:
For example yesterday in Geneva, on the first day of spring, we had another “support team” visiting us, those who are always ready to work off their payments while not having anything else to do, any other interests, hobbies or a properly paid job. A group of a few people including a cameraman, a lady of Uzbek origin Mutabar Tadjibaeva, who introduces herself as a president of the «Club des Coeurs Ardents» and guess who else? Exactly! Craig Murray – ex-ambassador to Uzbekistan, who had been scandalously fired from the British Foreign Office. He lived in Tashkent for a long time and had a relationship and even got married to a strip-bar dancer, he lobbied so-called businessmen including those from Pakistan willing to get cotton and other state contracts, those people had contacts with different Uzbek clan representatives including Bekzod Akhmedov. Akhmedov was seen many times in Craig Murray and his pseudo businessmen’s company in dens of iniquity of the capital, Bekzod Akhmedov’s favorite venues. It seems like the group of people that visited us in Geneva wanted to congratulate us with spring and express their grievance by screaming and as they said they wanted me or my sister Lola to come out. They attempted to sneak inside and walk around the house recording it all on video and we had nothing to do, but call the police and make our own video of this March invasion of “human right defenders” as they call themselves.
As I have never met Mr Akhmedov, or any Pakistani businessmen, or been involved in cotton trading, I think I have a pretty watertight case to sue Gulnara for libel. Unfortunately the lawyers I approached want £30,000 down. Our libel laws exist to protect the rich from exposure by the honest, not to protect the honest from the malice of the rich. If any lawyer reading wants to take this on pro bono, I should be delighted.
Talking of protection of the rich, Mutabar Tadjibaeva was eventually questioned by Swiss police for three hours over the “incident” in the video. I assure you nothing else happened other than what you see here. This is appalling harassment by the Swiss authorities. It is also racially aggravated harassment. The Uzbek Mission in Switzerland made the complaint by name equally against Mutabar and me, but the Swiss police chose only to harass the more vulnerable Mutabar, a survivor of severe torture in Uzbekistan. Truly disgraceful behaviour by the Swiss authorities.
“Our libel laws exist to protect the rich from exposure by the honest, not to protect the honest from the malice of the rich”
Very nicely put.
What evil people.
Is Gulnara’s English sufficient for her to have written that herself?
Try Leigh Day. They do a lot of pro bono work.
PS Interesting that the only choice of translation of the Russian captions is Africaans.
Craig, check out this firm. They may agree to work for you on a success fee, if they believe you have a solid case.
http://www.slatergordon.co.uk/about-us/
How I dearly hope this lawsuit goes ahead. It seems cast-iron to me (but of course I have no legal background). With the right legal firm you could win astronomical damages against a woman who would not miss a few millions. There is not just the association with Mr Akhmedov which is libellous but the claim that you were behaving in a manner that warranted calling the police. The video clearly shows you were not. Go for it. Spend the damages wisely.
The word ‘defamation’ appears straight-off in the 3rd para of the Slater Gordon’s ‘about us’ section.
Encouraged by John Goss’s positive remark, i drilled just a bit deeper:
“Corporate Social Responsibility
At Slater & Gordon Lawyers we recognise that we have an economic, environmental and social impact that goes beyond our core activity. Our corporate social responsibility programme is an important part of who we are and is designed to ensure this overall impact is a positive one.
As a firm we value inspiration, innovation and individual contributions. We treat our clients, and each other, with mutual respect and trust. We bring this approach to our CSR programme and aim to ensure all our people have the opportunity to get involved to help them develop to their full potential and be responsible citizens.
Our CSR programme has three key areas:
Pro bono
Community
Environment
Pro bono
Our lawyers undertake a wide range of pro bono (i.e. free) legal advice as part of their commitment to the wider community. This ranges from sorting leases for local parish councils to working on legal advice lines and taking on high profile individual pro bono cases, such as the recent NHS whistleblowing case.
Community involvement
As a firm dedicated to upholding the legal rights of individuals,….”
To read more about this from Slater & Gordon see: http://www.slatergordon.co.uk/about-us/corporate-social-responsibility/#ixzz2UJ3Ht34m
Follow us: @slatergordonUK on Twitter
Interestingly, the words pro bono AND whistle-blowing also appear in the above description. The Firm is very focussed on services to individual (as opposed to corporate clients). They come highly recommended so reiterate go for it…at a minimum, explore.
Villager, I’m going to bear Slater Gordon in mind.
Your intentness is admirable Craig, valuable in many ways. Still, you must be guarded. Expenses only close protection is always possible.
Sure thing, John. Decent, competent people.
Craig
Weren’t their reports that Akmedov had fled to Russia but after a period of time was then handed back to Uzbekistan and goodness knows what. All of which points to some sort of accommodation between Putin and Karimov over goodness knows what.
“there” not “their” in last post
RD – Goodness knows nothing about the Putin/Karimov afford. Putin is inclined towards the Amu Darya river wintering grounds of Siberian cranes and of course Rubles in Uzbek trade.
The Swiss authorities are as bad as the Uzbek ones.
Remember when poor Uwe Barschel was trying to save his political career in 1987, and was persuaded by the CiIA’s Ted Shackley apparently to go to Geneva under the ruse that one of its judges was really going to spill the beans about Oliver North’s wheeling and dealings there over Iran-Contra, especially the illegal arms shipments, only to be sedated by knock pills in a drink, had a slow-release poison put up his anus, and left to die in the bathtub of a hotel just a stone’s throw where Gulnara lives.
Of course, the assassination still remains unsolved like the ones that got it all started in Stockholm.
Would love to see such a case going ahead – but of course it’s easy for me to say that when Craig would be bearing the brunt.
It was reported Osborne has struck a deal with the Swiss Authorities that HMRC will from 2013 receive £500m annually forever as withholding tax on interest payable to UK taxable undeclared Swiss Deposit holders. Effectively it means the undeclared Swiss deposits amount to £2 TRILLION v The UK National Debt of £1.8T ! Salmond’s accountant is well advised to knock of the Scots share of 40% higher rate tax and 100% penalties against Independent Scotland’s 12.5% £150b due of the National Debt, whilst tallying the break up balances. Not forgetting the unfunded North Sea clean up costs on the £2 Trillion of oil already extracted so far.
And all I want is a permanent corrosion free 5mm pipe installed from the Famous Grouse distillery to my home in return for this revelation, as a consultancy fee.
As you say Ben Iraqi cherubs take a hit – apologies for the talk over.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V6HS6jyxoFE
Not ‘Ugly Rumours'(band) eh? Mr Tony Blair – more like the appalling truth; war criminal.
But would you still give her one ?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v5R5-NVvDMc
There’s a more indepth discussion of this here:
“Gulnara Karimova’s lies exposed
No-one stormed into the Uzbek president’s elder daughter’s mansion in Geneva, says a new film by Danish company MulberryMediaNet, “Search for dictator Karimov’s daughter”, posted on YouTube on 21 May.”
“In April, the Attorney General of Geneva, Olivier Jornot, ruled that Karimova’s accusations were groundless. Now Tajibayeva is “discussing with her colleagues and lawyers” the possibility of filing a case against the Uzbek presidential daughter for slander.”
http://www.uznews.net/news_single.php?lng=en&sub=&cid=30&nid=22826
Hello Mods,
Jon, can you please clear my latest comment on the Why I’m Convinced Anna Ardin is a Liar thread? It’s been held for moderation since midday – I suspect because it has a lot of links in it.
Thank you very much.
Arbed
Good luck with finding a lawyer to pursue your libel case “pro bono”, if that’s what you want to do.
I could not open that uznews link Herbie.
I came across this piece about her taking her campaign on to Twitter.
Saturday, May 25, 2013
Uzbekistan
Gulnara Karimova Takes To Twitter Following Critical Report
http://www.rferl.org/content/uzbekistan-karimova-twitter-response-critical-report-teliasonera/24995129.html
Getting a lawyer pro bono is one thing. Getting a lawyer to pay your costs for a failed lawsuit is quite another. Can anyone guarantee a win? Don’t get into a fight that you cannot afford to lose, Craig.
Come on mods. I know it’s the weekend but I want to read Arbed’s comment (see above at 7 pm).
If she has built those vaults for gold it’s public knowledge and the trick is; keeping it. Since the gold-standard was trenched we have had a ‘Looking Glass’ currency. Petro-dollar will not go gently into that good night and continues it’s propaganda war against gold and silver (silver being the manufacturing King with Gold, the Queen).
Now if she’s storing water….well Pakistan and India have added that to the nuclear equation. The Karamova’s can build fortresses to keep those blood diamonds and sanguinary cotton, but they won’t retain their gains from this world to the next.
Mark @ 5:34
Nothing unites us more than the suffering of innocents.
“Jon, can you please clear my latest comment on the Why I’m Convinced Anna Ardin is a Liar thread?”
Would it not be a good idea to have easy handy links to the threads that are still going strong, as this thread & the Al Halli one ? It would remind people that they are still active, and save searching for them.
****We (Macky,Sofia Zablotna-Habbercake, nevermind) nominate the Poster “Habbabkuk (La vita è bella!)” for expulsion from this Blog.****
Jemand,
I appreciate the concern, but as I have never met Mr Akhmedov or these Pakistani businessmen, or ever lobbied for a cotton contract, I really don’t see how I can lose. Remember I have never met these people, and the burden of proof is not on me to prove that. Gulnara has to prove I have met them and done these things, which as I have not, will be extraordinarily difficult. I am not in an Oscar Wilde situation here. I will, however, be able to insure against that eventuality at not too high a cost.
If your case is strong enough you can get a lawyer to do it for ‘free’, Craig. ‘Free’ in the US will cost you 1/3 of the settlement, so beware.
Craig,
There are 131 companies that appear in the Responsible Sourcing Network’s company pledge against Uzbek cotton that you can find here:
http://www.sourcingnetwork.org/the-cotton-pledge
Gildan doesn’t appear.
How effectively companies ‘police’ themselves, I don’t know…but at least it makes the effort of looking like something positive?
Craig..you in a den of iniquity ? Perish the thought.
In that case Craig, I hope you seek some free legal advice from a sympathetic expert in libel to draft a strategy. You want your case so narrow and tight, you cannot possibly lose. I guess the only problem is calculating the damage and therefore the payout. No doubt, it would be a welcome inflow of funds. Of course, the publicity surrounding such a case would also be invaluable for the exposure of this spider woman’s crimes against her own people. Perhaps such publicity would be assessed to be so damaging to her already dubious reputation that she might settle out of court. It might therefore be of value to create some pre-trial publicity, like in this blog, to help expedite the matter to an agreeable end.
I liked the Oscar Wilde comparison. A good lesson in that particular case.