Viktor Kozeny To Be Extradited To Prague?

by Amanda Banks, Tax-News.com, London

11 August 2004

The Czech Republic state prosecutor said yesterday that he would apply to the Bahamas for the extradition of fugitive Czech-born financier Viktor Kozeny, using an obscure 1925 agreement between Britain and Czechoslovakia on the handing over of criminals which covered British colonies as well as the mainland.

Svetlana Klouckova, of the international branch of the state prosecutor's office, said that the agreement should still apply to the Bahamas, although the territory has been independent since 1973.

Kozeny, who holds Irish citizenship and lives in the Bahamas, is wanted in the Czech Republic in relation to a coupon privatisation scheme in which thousands of people in then-Czechoslovakia lost around 300 million dollars (243 million euros) in the early 1990s.

Last October, Kozeny was also indicted in New York on charges of misappropriating $182 million from clients of NY-based hedge fund firm, Omega Advisors Inc., by persuading them to invest in privatisation schemes in Azerbaijan.

It was reported at the time that a number of pending civil lawsuits against him (filed in the US, the United Kingdom, the Bahamas, and the British Virgin Islands) had been shelved in order to allow the New York criminal trial to go ahead. Benjamin Brafman, Kozeny's attorney announced that his client "vigorously denies that any investor was deceived or defrauded. Each of the investors in this case were very sophisticated individuals or organizations who did their own due diligence. They knew exactly what they were investing in, and they got precisely what they bargained for."

In July, a request by Kozeny for long-term residency in the Czech Republic, associated with an unsuccessful bid to be elected as a member of the European Parliament (thereby gaining immunity from prosecution in the EU) was rejected. In May, Irish Justice Minister Michael McDowell hinted that Ireland was considering stripping Kozeny of his Irish citizenship.

Kozeny lives openly in the Bahamas with his family, although in reduced circumstances since most of his assets were frozen when civil judgements were obtained against him between 2000 and 2003. The status of extradition proceedings brought by the US authorities is unclear.

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