Sanctions evaders have created a new "empire"

 

The UK has imposed sanctions against a large-scale network of shadow oil traders led by Tahir Garayev, a Cheka-OGPU and Rucriminal.info figure, and Igor Sechin's business partner, Etibar Eyyub, who trades Russian sanctioned oil. The list includes 175 companies linked to the shadow traders and the 2RIVERS GROUP (formerly CORAL ENERGY GROUP) network, as well as 48 tankers transporting oil. In total, at least $90 billion worth of oil has passed through the hands of Garayev & Co. in the past few months alone. It turns out that the empire of sanctioned oil traders includes not only the Azerbaijani segment, but also the Uzbek segment.

After Etibar Eyyub and Garayev's first companies were sanctioned and effectively unable to operate, oil traders began creating new companies en masse, processing several shipments of Russian oil through them, and then liquidating the legal entities to cut ties. Crude oil was typically documented as "export blend" with no country of origin specified.

 

To create a business of this scale (including a network of short-lived companies), new, "under-the-radar" managers were needed. Their partners were found in Uzbekistan. Most of the companies included in the new UK sanctions list appear unrelated at first glance—they are registered at different addresses and in different countries. However, most of them have websites offering services and contact information (the websites are currently offline, but the email addresses on the domains are still active). These domains turned out to be linked to a shared server, which British investigators used to uncover the entire network.

 

One of the top managers of the Garayev-Eyyub network is Azerbaijani citizen Bilal Aliyev, who bought the Hong Kong company Bellatrix Energy from its previous owners in 2022 and began trading with Igor Sechin's Rosneft, transporting oil to countries in Asia and Africa. In December 2022, Bellatrix Energy Ltd. received an average of 151,000 barrels of oil daily. Payments for the goods were transferred to it by, among others, Rosselkhozbank and the Regional Development Bank, where the company had large credit lines. Aliyev's activities were previously known, but it has since been revealed that he controls several other legal entities: Allegro Development Limited, Foxton FZCO, Disentis Trading Limited, Alroy Holdings Limited, Omni Marine and Transport, Zenith Global Corporation Limited, Zenrock Holding Limited, and Lumira Capital Limited FZE. Apparently, through him, Garayev's network is connected to a structure within Azerbaijan's state oil and gas company, SOCAR. For example, Disentis Trading Limited is believed to be a link in the chain of companies belonging to former SOCAR top manager Adnan Ahmedzad. He was detained by Azerbaijani security forces last year, and the case involves his counterparties from Azerbaijan, Malta, Cyprus, and Albania.

 

Foxton FZCO's director is Uzbek citizen Islombek Blakhatov, who also manages several other companies: Al-Tasmeem Group FZE, Birchwood Resources, and Shreevaani Exim FZE. Another manager in the oil trading network is his compatriot, Feruzabonu Abdullayev (listed as the director of Zenrock Global Corporation Ltd and Disentis Trading Limited). Additionally, four companies are registered to a certain Umid Mokhomodzhanov: Skyion Solutions FZE, Newton Resources FZE, EcoMatrix Oil and Commodity FZE, and Totcor Trade FZE. He also became the director of Vault Energy Resources DMCC, Sentura GLobal FZE, and Navratan Ventures FZE. These companies are on the new UK sanctions list. Abdilkholim Yuldashov (whose companies include Fusion Flux Energy, Fadas Trade, Tanzhouli Integrated FZE, RafflonLine FZE, Ethos Dynamics FZE, and Colwhich Continental FZE) and Dastonbek Isakov (TradeStream FZE, Rockwell Energy, Ossydey Integrated FZE, and Marinex Trade FZE) also became employees of the "Uzbek cluster."

 

After 175 companies were sanctioned, Tahir Garayev and Etibar Eyyub are now in a busy time: they need to fill the missing links in the chain and find new nominees and managers for Sechin's oil. And companies will likely be registered in the UAE and Hong Kong in batches again.

 

As previously reported by VChK-OGPU and Rucriminal.info, Garayev's group operated in Latvia, where their representative was a certain Jurius Sokolovs (who left the company in 2023). In Riga, in 2018, the group purchased Venta Energy Services, a company that provides financial and consulting services to businesses, and in 2019, registered its representative office, also in Switzerland. The company is affiliated with Polar Energy SA and cites its address (Rue de l'Arquebuse 7) in Swiss documentation. Furthermore, Akhmed Keremova has served on the Riga company's board of directors since 2018. He was also a prominent figure in Azerbaijan when he joined Garayev's group. He is the head of risk management at Azercell Telecom, a member of the board of directors of a major cement manufacturer, NORM LLC, and an advisor to the CEO of a leading Azerbaijani company. He is the head of the corporate PASHA Bank, lives in Switzerland, and is responsible for the financial side of Garayev's group. For example, about a year ago, Kerimov attended a small event at Arab Bank (Switzerland) Ltd. and thanked its top managers for their collaboration. By that time, it was already known that Coral Energy and a group of Azerbaijani businessmen associated with it were trading Russian oil from Sechin, circumventing sanctions.

 

Terrene Energy is another active Dubai company affiliated with Garayev's group and registered at the same UAE address as Coral. It specializes in India, Turkey, and Russia.

 

The billions earned from sanctioned oil enabled the group's management to live lavishly. Garayev, for example, was known to change cars in Moscow like gloves – his garage has everything: Audi, BMW, Lexus, Mercedes, Bentley. He's flown to Switzerland more than 90 times in recent years, using his Swiss phone number hardly more often than his Russian ones. However, these trips weren't always connected to corporate interests: for example, Etibar Eyyoub acquired land in Switzerland and intended to build a family villa on "Billionaires' Hill," not far from the palace of Frenchman Jean-Pierre Valentini, the former leader of the oil company Trafigura, from whom Garayev's Nord Axis purchased shares in Vostok Oil (a Rosneft project) in 2022. However, it's said that sanctions cut off Etibar's bank accounts, leaving him with no way to pay his workers, and his property remains an overgrown vacant lot. Anar Madatli is buying up real estate in Moscow: in 2017, he bought an apartment (92 square meters) in the Arbat area, on 1 Smolensky Lane, in the Freedom residential complex developed by Donstroy. In 2019, he acquired shares in several non-residential premises on the ground floor of a new building on Demyana Bednogo Street (Khoroshevo-Mnevniki), which is now rented by large stores such as Miratorg. In 2020, he acquired a third of a 560-square-meter non-residential space in the Moskva Tower on Presnenskaya Embankment in Moscow-City (Anar Madatli's company, TES, where Tahir Garayev worked, is also registered in the same tower). In 2021, he acquired a parking space next to a new building near Arbat. He also owns an apartment on Vorotnikovsky Lane, in central Moscow.