Unaoil

Unaoil

Unaoil is a Monaco-based company, incorporated in the British Virgin Islands, which provides "industrial solutions to the energy sector in the Middle East, Central Asia and Africa."

History

The company, which is run by the Ahsani family, was founded in 1991. The family is headed by Ata Ahsani. Ata and his two sons Cyrus and Saman run the energy industry consultancy Unaoil, and his third son, Sassan, heads the British property company Lumina Real Estate Capital.

Bribery scandal

In 2010, Unaoil entered into an agreement with Leighton Holdings with the aim of securing a $500 million oil pipeline contract in Iraq. In 2011 Leighton Holdings referred the deal to the police as corruption. In 2014 a High Court of Justice judge queried the corruption claims after Unaoil denied them in a civil litigation matter involving Leighton Holdings. In 2016, the Serious Fraud Office (United Kingdom) (SFO) alleged before the High Court of Justice in a separate case brought by Unaoil that the firm was engaged in "extensive" corruption. Unaoil's litigation, in which it alleged the SFO had acted unlawfully, was dismissed by the High Court.

In March 2016, the SFO began investigating allegations of Unaoil's acting corruptly in facilitating business deals involving Rolls Royce, Halliburton-KBR, Petrofac, ABB, Leighton Holdings and Amec Foster Wheeler.

In the United States, KBR, FMC Technologies and Core Laboratories all disclosed in 2016 that they had been contacted by the Department of Justice (DOJ) in connection with a probe of Unaoil.

The SFO and DOJ inquiries followed media reports that Unaoil allegedly facilitated extensive corruption and bribery in the oil industry.[9] A leaked cache of Unaoil internal company emails dating from 2001 to 2012 were the subject of a series of articles published by Fairfax Media investigative reporters Nick McKenzie, Richard Baker and Michael Bachelard in the Australian newspaper The Age, and The Huffington Post in March 2016. Under headlines such as "Unaoil: World's Biggest Bribe Scandal"[9] and "Unaoil: Company that Bribed the World", The Age wrote that

"How they make their money is simple. Oil-rich countries often suffer poor governance and high levels of corruption. Unaoil's business plan is to play on the fears of large Western companies that they cannot win contracts without its help. Its operatives then bribe officials in oil-producing nations to help these clients win government-funded projects. The corrupt officials might rig a tender committee. Or leak inside information. Or ensure a contract is awarded without a competitive tender".

In Iraq, Unaoil was alleged to have paid "multi-million dollar lump sums" to senior politicians. Other oil producing countries that Unaoil have operated in include Iran, Libya, Syria, Yemen, Kuwait, and the UAE.

In March 2016 the Sydney Morning Herald published a letter from a legal representative of Unaoil in which the allegations of corruption and bribery are denied.

On 31 March 2016, Monaco authorities announced that they had raided the offices of Unaoil and the homes of some of its executives, following an urgent request for assistance from the SFO. The statement said, "These searches and interviews were carried out in the presence of British officials as part of a vast, international corruption scandal implicating numerous foreign oil industry firms. The information collected is going to be examined by the British authorities as part of their investigation." The UK National Crime Agency carried out their investigation in collaboration with the Australian Federal Police and the Federal Bureau of Investigation.

On 27 February 2017, an article in the News Corp-owned The Australian presented an alternative perspective on the Unaoil bribery scandal. This claimed that the Fairfax Media newspapers had settled claims made against them regarding false allegations and indicated that "within weeks, the publisher will be confronted with yet another legal action, this time from the company at the centre of the allegations that triggered these backdowns. That company is Unaoil, a Monaco-based business that is a player in the international oil industry and is owned by the Ashani family." The article claimed that the leaker of the company emails was an extortionist who had hacked Unaoil, and stated that Unaoil would seek through court to identify the sources for the 2016 articles. The Australian had previously reported Unaoil's denials of the allegations, and accusation that it was the victim of extortion, on 17 May 2016.

In November 2016, the UK Treasury announced it was giving the SFO 'blockbuster funding' to resource the agency's Unaoil probe. That same month, a former Unaoil country manager told the BBC's Panorama programme he had bribed a Libyan government official. The whistleblower, Lindsay Mitchell, said that in 2009 he handed an envelope filled with US dollars to a manager at a subsidiary of the state-owned Libyan National Oil Company.

In January 2017, the DOJ announced in a statement that Rolls Royce had agreed to pay a $170 million fine to settle corruption allegations involving its use of several facilitators to win contracts, including Unaoil.

Ongoing investigations by the SFO were reported in April 2017. In May 2017, listed UK company Petrofac suspended a top executive in connection to the Unaoil investigation.

On March 25 2019, CEO Cyrus Ahsani and COO Saman Ahsani pled guilty for their roles in a scheme to corruptly facilitate millions of dollars in bribe payments to officials in multiple countries.

Corruption charges laid by the SFO

On 17 November 2017, the Serious Fraud Office charged two former Unaoil Iraq managers with conspiring to pay bribes to win Dutch company SBM Offshore contracts in Iraq. The Iraq officials allegedly bribed were not named. The SFO also issued extradition proceedings against Unaoil Chief Operations Officer Saman Ahsani.

On 30 July 2020 Stephen Whiteley, the company's former territory manager for Iraq was sentenced to 3 years in prison. Ziad Akle, another former Iraq territory manager, received 5 years in prison.

Conviction quashed

On 10 December 2021, The Law Society Gazette reported that the conviction of Ziad Akle had been quashed and the UK Serious Fraud Office (SFO) accused of a “serious failure” in a damning judgment by London’s Court of Appeal. Lawyers representing Ziad Akle, who was sentenced to five years’ imprisonment last July for two counts of conspiracy to give corrupt payments, said SFO director Lisa Osofsky’s position is now ‘untenable’ and called for a public inquiry ‘to establish the extent of this misconduct’.

Ziad Akle, 46, was alleged to have paid bribes between 2005 and 2009 to influence the terms of contracts and obtain sensitive information about projects to increase Iraq’s crude oil exports after the overthrow of Saddam Hussein in 2003. The SFO secured four convictions, including Akle’s, in relation to the Unaoil energy consultancy but did not prosecute the Ahsanis – the family which owned and controlled the company.

Cyrus and Saman Ahsani, Unaoil’s chief executive and chief operating officer, cut a deal with the US authorities and still await sentencing while their father, Unaoil’s chairman Ata Ahsani, was not prosecuted.

In his ruling, Lord Justice Holroyde said the SFO’s refusal to provide that material at trial was "a serious failure by the SFO to comply with their duty":

"The underlying documents illustrate very clearly why it was wholly inappropriate for the SFO to have any dealings with Tinsley in relation to the pleas of Al Jarah and Akle," Holroyde said.

There was "a clear conflict of interest" between the Ahsanis, and Tinsley acting on their behalf, and Akle and Al Jarah. The SFO’s case team "quite rightly declined, for a considerable time, to have any dealings with Tinsley" in relation to Akle and Al Jarah, but then changed their mind.

Holroyde said: "We simply do not understand how any of their SFO colleagues could have thought it appropriate to take any other approach, or why the stance taken by the case team later changed."

He added that Tinsley was "arguably encouraged" by the SFO to suggest to Al Jarah, "behind the backs of his legal representatives" to plead guilty – a plea which was used against Akle at his trial.

Tinsley was "the last person whom the SFO should have allowed, or caused, to undertake the role of trying to persuade [Al Jarah] and Akle to plead guilty (and thereby to benefit the Ahsanis in their dealings with the SFO)", Holroyde said. The Court of Appeal refused to order a retrial.

International law firm Paul Hastings said after the ruling that the case "raises serious questions over Lisa Osofsky’s tenure as director of the SFO", adding that "if the SFO is to survive then her position is untenable following this judgment."

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References

This page imported content from Wikipedia on 14 December 2021.
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