The Shaykhantakhur Interdistrict Civil Court issued a ruling on the lawsuit filed by Ultimo Group Limited against Radio Ozodlik, the Uzbek Service of Radio Liberty at the final hearing on July 29.
The lawsuit against Radio Ozodlik and its journalist Lazizkhon Olimov (a.k.a. Aziz Nur) was filed by Ultimo Group Limited, which is engaged in the wholesale sale of natural gas, and separately by its owner Tukhvatkhuja Anvarkhujaev. The reason for the lawsuit was Ozodlik's Youtube investigation released in April.
Judge Abdukodir Rajabov began hearing the case on July 12. The plaintiff was represented by Davronbek Akhmatov, an attorney at the Prae Legal law firm. Executives of Uztransgaz were also present at the hearing. The defendant did not participate in the process.
The attorney said that he had repeatedly notified Lazizhon Olimov and Radio Ozodlik about the trial, called their office in Prague and asked them to participate. The judge said that a copy of the statement of claim and the summons were sent to Ozodlik by email. The summons was also sent to Lazizhon Olimov’s home in Tashkent. However, his mother did not accept the summons, stating that her son did not live there.
The defense attorney stated in court that the stories on the Youtube video were not true. According to him, the financial and reputational damage was caused to Tukhfatkhuzhi Anvarkhuzhaev and Ultimo Group Limited, in which he owns 50% of the shares.
He said that after Ozodlik published the materials, many of the businessman’s business partners “doubted his integrity and stopped working together.”
At the time of filing the lawsuit, the video published on the Ozodlik YouTube page had been viewed more than 1 million times (now - over 1.4 million), 3,800 (4,132) comments were written about it, of which 2,000 were negative, and more than 1,200 were offensive, he said.
"These hate and offensive comments will certainly leave their mark, that is, they will harm the entrepreneur and his business reputation, the dignity and development of the company's business," the attorney said.
The idea that the company has turned into an organization supplying large volumes of gas in a short period of time is not true, he said. Ultimo Group Limited was registered under the laws of Uzbekistan on March 10, 2021, 50% of its shares belong to the plaintiff, that is, Tukhfatkhuja Anvarkhuzhaev, the rest - to Matlyuba Kayumova (50%). The company imported gas from abroad (Turkmenistan) and supplied it to the Kyzylkumcement cement plant in the autumn-winter season, when wholesale consumers faced gas shortages. That is, the company did not sell Uzbek gas and was not an intermediary for its sale, the attorney emphasized.
The report noted that Ultimo Group Limited is associated with Ultimo Group FZE-LLC, registered in Sharjah (UAE), and Ultimo Group FZCO in Dubai.
Davronbek Akhmatov reported that the media did not present a single valid document confirming the presence of ties with these companies in the UAE. Ultimo Group Limited has no relation to the above-mentioned foreign companies and this information is not true, the attorney said.
The attorney noted that the claims that "from London to Hong Kong there is a single network of companies" are also not true, and this is considered "dissemination of information with the aim of damaging the company's reputation."
The Ozodlik's video noted that Ultimo Group Limited “unexpectedly, in a short period of time,” became a partner in many gas contracts in Uzbekistan. According to the defense, the company has never been involved in the supply, sale, or mediation of Uzbek gas.
He said that the radio station did not provide any contract or documents confirming that the company was an intermediary in gas deals. This media outlet “discredited the name of the company and the plaintiff by disseminating untrue, false, fabricated” information, he said.
The video story said: “Why are strategic enterprises of the state being forced to buy gas from Ultimo Group Limited LLC, which exists on paper but does not exist in practice? Why did those at the top of the government provide this phantom company with such a favor? What is this LLC doing in the relationship between the Turkmengas production company and the state-owned Uztransgaz company?”
According to the lawsuit filed by the director of Ultimo Group Limited, no one was actually granted a benefit, the company's activities are carried out on the basis of a license registered in the established manner. The head of the enterprise, as an entrepreneur, reached agreements with a gas producing company from Turkmenistan and a gas supplying company (Uztransgaz), found buyers himself and supplied gas, the attorney said. The statements of Ozodlik also had a direct negative impact on the business reputation of the company, the honor and dignity of the individual, the statement noted.
The video also mentions the identity of the current founders of Ultimo Group Limited, including businessman Tukhfatkhuja Anvarkhuzhaev, who, as Ozodlik notes, “boasts that his name and surname are from the generation of hodjas.” The report states that Anvarkhuzhaev is the son of Shavkat Agzamkhodjaev, one of the long-time employees of the State Security Service, and the nephew of the Ambassador of Uzbekistan to Turkey Alisher Agzamkhodjaev.
The attorney stated that the information in the video harms the dignity of the businessman as a person. “Why are personal information disclosed? What does this have to do with his family?” he noted. The attorney also denied the connection of the company and its director with executives of the country's leadership.
In the lawsuit, the director of Ultimo Group Limited voiced disagreement with other items of the Ozodlik report and demanded the publication of a refutation, as well as compensation for moral damages worth of 100 million soums, 8 thousand USD.
At the next meeting on July 19, executives of Uztransgaz spoke and confirmed that Ultimo Group Limited had been selling the Turkmen gas to Kyzylkumcement. The infrastructure of Uztransgaz's main gas pipelines was used for deliveries, with which "only a transportation agreement" was signed.
An executive of the gas transportation company said that Uztransgaz is a subject of a natural monopoly, therefore "it is impossible to refuse to conclude a gas transportation agreement, but it is necessary to take into account technological capabilities."
According to him, transportation prices are approved by the Intergovernmental Price Commission under the Cabinet of Ministers, chaired by Deputy Prime Minister Jamshid Kuchkarov.
He added that in the autumn-winter period of 2021, a gas shortage arose against the backdrop of the launch of many industrial enterprises and "an increase in construction volumes in recent years by 30-40%." A executive of Uztransgaz reported that cement plants were idle in winter due to a lack of gas, but Kyzylkumcement had obligations to the initiators of the Tashkent City project, for the implementation of which raw materials were required. In the event of a disruption in supplies, a fine was envisaged.
He recalled that Kyzylkumcement purchased gas from Ultimo Group Limited for 1,000 soums - the same price was for consumers of the third category.
The specialist also emphasized that Uztransgaz did not pay Ultimo Group Limited for gas imports.
The final meeting on July 29 was attended by linguistic experts, a master's student and a doctoral student majoring in philology, as well as in literature and the Uzbek language, who assessed the statements voiced in the investigation.
They assessed such words as "arvokh" (ghost), "urtakash" (middleman), "yashirin faoliyat" (hidden activity) and others, as well as the context. The plaintiff's side also received a conclusion from the Center for Training in the Basics of Office Work in the State Language and Advanced Training at the Tashkent State University of Uzbek Language and Literature, which also pointed out the above and other episodes that negatively affect the business reputation of the company, the honor and dignity of its founder.
Following the meeting, the court, chaired by Abdukodir Rajabov, decided to satisfy the claim of Ultimo Group Limited and Tukhvatkhuzhi Anvarkhuzhaev and ordered Radio Ozodlik to publish a refutation with the payment of 100 million soums in compensation for moral damages.
Ultimo Group Limited was registered on March 10, 2021, and a month later signed a contract with Kyzylkumcement (at that time a state-owned plant, later privatized) for 315 billion soums (about $30 million) for gas supplies.
