The Uzbekistani Justice Ministry has announced the transfer of US$10 million to the state budget following the sale of luxurious real estate in Paris that once belonged to the disgraced daughter of the country’s late president.

OCCRP has focused several previous investigations on the corrupt and criminal business practices of Gulnara Karimova, eldest daughter of former leader Islam Karimov.

The eccentric business woman is currently serving a sentence totalling 13 years at a prison in the capital of Tashkent on charges stemming from her corrupt business practices.

Sevara Urinbayeva, chief press officer for the Uzbekistani Ministry of Justice, said in a press statement on Tuesday that the sale of Karimova’s Parisian property - located in the extravagant Marshal Manouri Street Triplex residential complex - forms part of a larger effort to repatriate almost $1.5 billion of her criminally-obtained foreign holdings, according to KUN.UZ.

In March, OCCRP reported that Karimova had received an additional sentence of eight years - on charges including extortion, racketeering, money laundering and misuse of public funds - further to her convictions in 2015 and 2017 for extortion and embezzlement.

Her lawyer, Grégoire Mangeat, condemned the charges against his client as evidence of Uzbekistan’s ongoing disregard for her human rights.

Karimova also faces indictments in Switzerland and the US, on suspicion of money laundering and extortion respectively, as well as a civil recovery action in the UK.

occrp.org