The family of Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev has been tied to secret offshore companies, according to a massive leak of documents from the Panamanian law firm Mossack Fonseca.
On April 3, an international consortium of journalists released the preliminary conclusions of leak of documents on some 214,000 offshore companies created by the law firm over the last 40 years.
According to the findings, Aliyev's wife, Mehriban Aliyeva, was named one of two managers of a Panamanian offshore firm in 2005, a firm that in turn has control of the Azerbaijani conglomerate AtaHolding. Aliyev's three children and top officials in Azerbaijan's tax office were named as beneficiaries in one document, although it is not clear if that proposal was ever officially adopted.
Aliyev's two daughters controlled a Panamanian firm that held a significant stake in a group of companies developing Azerbaijani goldfields.
President Aliyev's sister was also reported to be the sole shareholder of a British Virgin Islands firm set up in 2005. The firm's registration lists her address as a home in a posh neighborhood of West London.