BAKU
Azerbaijan’s government, on a declared, merciless war-path to root out high-level corruption, has detained officials from the country’s once-sacrosanct, all-mighty customs service.
A raid on the headquarters of the department occurred late on May 17. The operation was conducted by the Main Directorate of the Battle with Corruption of the General Prosecutors Office of Azerbaijan of the City of Baku.
On May 18, the General Prosecutor’s Office and the State Customs Committee reported five officials had been officially charged. Among them were Department of Special Customs Procedures of the Main Directorate of the Baku Customs terminal, Aydin Eilazov, the Chief Inspector of the Department of Customs Procedures and Payments, Emin Khalilov, Customs post inspector Miraga Agayev, and two others. They are charged under Article 311.3.2 (repeated bribery) of the Criminal Code.
The customs HQ raid is the latest in a series of detentions, arrests, and investigations which have riven up speed since Azerbaijan’s lightning-strike military victory against Armenia.
In late 2020, Azerbaijan retook seven districts of its country occupied since 1993-1994 and parts of the Azerbaijan Nagorno-Karabakh district (in Soviet times, referred to as the NKAO) – a USSR “autonomous” district within the Azerbaijan Soviet Socialist Republic (ASSR). A nearly thirty-year occupation by Armenian forces followed.
More than 600,000 ethnic Azeris were ethnically cleansed in the early 1990s, mostly from the seven districts around the Azerbaijani Nagorno-Karabakh region. Rebuilding is gradually getting underway.
YET ANOTHER PHASE IN CEASELESS CORRUPTION ARRESTS
Since then, the government has stepped up an official anti-corruption effort. Arrested just in recent weeks have been: a government minister, three generals, including two former high ranking security ministry high-rollers, a de facto head of a state-dominated steel racket, and senior officials of the Baku city executive government.
A decorated military general was rounded up on a murder charge as a result of a bar brawl in Kyiv, Ukraine 20 years ago. He is charged under articles 12.1, 120.2.2 (premeditated murder) and 12.1, 221.3 (hooliganism) of the criminal code for allegedly stabbing a man to the heart.
President Aliyev, clearly emboldened by the war-victory, has made no bones about the fact that the days of wild west corruption were over in Azerbaijan.
Earlier this year, he declared at a session of the ruling Yeni Azərbaycan (New Azerbaijan) party, that “a new era of transparency and honesty has entered the country’s economy. The era of monopolies has come to an end.”
First lady and First Deputy Vice President Mehriban Aliyeva is widely seen by diplomats in the region to be a major force behind the house cleaning, and intent on refreshing the leadership with new faces.
CUSTOMS SERVICE ONCE FEARED, NOW INCREASINGLY UNDER SCRUTINY
The country’s once awe-inspiring Customs service was once so synonymous with shakedowns as to make teeth chatter among the timid.
Bribery, the creation of artificial import monopolies, and red tape made life difficult for importers who did not have the proper connections. It also scared away many foreign investors.
It was regarded as the most “profitable” government ministry to serve in – from a personal perspective.
Yet its ability to inspire fear has faded.
In perhaps the most famous case, in 2018 about 100 of its employees were fired due to corruption.
“If you think that’s the end of the saga, you’re wrong,” one analyst in Baku told the Tribune. “The point is to show that no one is above the law,” she said.
Some traditional sceptics have said the arrests may also be connected to personal score-settling, but given the wide range of those arrested or charged, there is yet not much evidence to support this.