No:509/21, Information of the Press Service Department of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Azerbaijan on the meeting of the Conference of States Parties to the UN Convention against Corruption
On December 13-17, 2021, the 9th session of the Conference of States Parties to the UN Convention against Corruption is being held in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt. On December 14, 2021, within the framework of the session, a special event entitled "Misuse of fundraising activities for corruption and related criminal purposes" was organized by the Azerbaijani delegation.
Prosecutor General of the Republic of Azerbaijan Kamran Aliyev and senior official of the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) Tim Steele made opening remarks at the event, which was held on a hybrid basis in a panel discussion format.
In his speech, Prosecutor General Kamran Aliyev noted that fundraising activities carried out by non-profit organizations and charitable foundations play an important role in providing humanitarian support to people in crisis situations, however, as a result of limited control over such activities, some of them are used for criminal purposes, such as corruption, money laundering, and terrorist financing. In this regard, the Prosecutor General noted that Azerbaijan suffers from this problem, drawing the attention of participants to the illegal fundraising campaigns organized by Armenian diaspora organizations during the Patriotic War last year.
At the event, the presentations were made by experts from the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, the European Center for Not-for-Profit Law, the British NGO “Greenacre” and the Financial Monitoring Service (FMS) of the Republic of Azerbaijan, and interactive discussions were held.
In their presentations, speakers highlighted the need to develop special rules to prevent the abuse in fundraising campaigns organized by charitable foundations, the use of virtual currencies and the uncontrolled segment of the internet to finance criminal activities by some charitable organizations, the use of some banks and other financial institutions as intermediaries in such activities, and other points.
Speaking at the event, the representative of FMS noted that during the 44-day war between Armenia and Azerbaijan, Armenian diaspora organizations operating abroad collected $170 million, of which $110 million was illegally transferred to the Armenian budget. He stressed that this fact was acknowledged by high-ranking Armenian officials, including the Prime Minister, and that the money, which was fraudulently collected from citizens of different countries under the guise of humanitarian aid and transferred to the Armenian state budget, was used to arm illegal armed groups previously deployed in the territories of Azerbaijan liberated from occupation.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs states that the Azerbaijani side will continue, within the framework of all international platforms, to work purposefully to expose and prevent fundraising campaigns organized by Armenian diaspora organizations in various countries and aimed against the sovereignty of Azerbaijan.