News reports originating from two Russian news outlets Ferghana News and Interfax, state that “Russian investigators are looking into the Uzbek authorities' decision to strip mobile operator Uzdunrobita, a subsidiary of Russia's MTS, of its license earlier this year along with the seizure of company property and assets. Uzbek authorities claim the MTS subsidiary owes some $1 billion, approximately the amount invested by MTS in Uzbekistan. Russia's Interior Ministry has filed a criminal case against the seizures of MTS property and assets in Uzbekistan”. It is unclear what the outcome of this investigation was. The same report suggest that Russian investigators seized a “$10-million Moscow apartment belonging to the daughter of Uzbekistan's president [Karimova]… as part of an investigation” in 2012.
In the statement issued by the Prosecutor-General’s Office of the Republic of Uzbekistan (28 July 2017) authorities say that they are seeking to freeze Karimova’s “property in Moscow consisting of a penthouse, a villa complex, eight apartments, a hotel compound, a house, and a land lot”, totalling US $2,000,000, as well as US $6,000,000 in cash. A statement issued by Sevara Urinbayeva, Head of Public Relations for the Uzbek Ministry of Justice, on Telegram states that “the court of Moscow recognized the sentences of the Uzbek courts in relation to G. Karimova and her accomplices and is currently taking measures on organizing work with the Russian side on the sale of confiscated property for the further return of the proceeds to the Republic of Uzbekistan” (translated using google translate). The status of these seizures is unclear.
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