Lazareva to appeal ruling
‘Guilty in misuse of funds’
KUWAIT CITY, May 24: Marsha Lazareva, one of the most prominent foreign businesswomen in the Middle East, has vowed to appeal the verdict which has sentenced her to 10 years imprisonment with hard labor after finding her guilty of misusing public funds in Kuwait, reports Al-Anba daily quoting Forbes International Magazine.
The Russian national and mother of a 4-year-old stood trial on May 6 in relation to her position as chief executive and vice-chairman of private equity group KGL Investment (KGLI).
Lazareva, who has been at the head KGLI since 2007, was found guilty in Kuwait of illegally taking the Kuwait Port Authority monies. She continues to deny the charge.
Lazareva and another defendant were jointly fined 22 million Kuwaiti dinars ($73 million) and ordered to return 11 million Kuwaiti dinars ($36 million).
Six defendants in addition to Lazareva were given imprisonment terms of between 10 and 15 years.
In her only interview following the case, Lazareva said she will pursue her innocence through an appeal.
“In spite of numerous requests by my lawyers, the judge denied me full access to all accusatory documents and also denied my calling of all my witnesses,” she said.
“When I was accused in April 2017, I immediately returned to Kuwait from a business trip to Europe to clear my good name and reputation.
“All my human and civil rights were completely violated during the court hearings. The judge made many racist comments toward me during the case and singled me out as a woman.”
Lazareva’s case began when a former KGLI employee filed a complaint that she was involved in spying and intelligence gathering on behalf of a foreign country.
She was accused in April 2017, arrested last November and then held in prison for seven weeks before being released on bail of 9 million Kuwaiti dinars ($30 million).
On her release, she was given a travel ban and had a team of government agents tailing her every move.
However, as her legal team at Londonbased law firm Brown Rudnick was preparing to defend her against the spying charges, those accusations were replaced with a charge of assisting embezzlement relating to the period between April 2006 and March 2013.
Lazareva’s lawyers were given one week to examine 18,000 pages of allegations before she faced Judge Metaeb Al Alredi on Sunday, May 6.
However, concerns are growing as she sits in the Sulaibiya prison in Kuwait, where she shares a small cell with seven other women. The prison has an official capacity of 2,500 inmates but is currently grossly overcrowded and housing 6,000 detainees
KGLI manages the Port Fund, which invests in mid-sized, high-potential port management and logistics-related businesses, including a joint venture that built the logistics hub Global Gateway Logistics City on a former US military base in the Philippines.