UAE extradites Kazakh national accused of large-scale oil smuggling

A Kazakh citizen suspected of involvement in the illegal trade of oil products has been extradited from the United Arab Emirates to Kazakhstan, according to the Kazakh Prosecutor General’s Office.

Officers from the Prosecutor General’s Office and the Financial Monitoring Agency secured the extradition of the suspect, who is accused of organising large-scale illegal oil sales in the Aktobe region between 2022 and 2023 while serving as the director of a commercial company, Caliber.Az reports via Kazakh media.

Investigators allege that the suspect, acting in collusion with others, unlawfully sold oil worth over 300 million tenge (approximately $635,000). After committing the crime, he fled Kazakhstan and was placed on an international wanted list.

In 2024, the fugitive was located in Dubai and extradited to Kazakhstan at the request of the Prosecutor General’s Office. He has since been placed in a pretrial detention facility.

A co-conspirator in the same case was convicted earlier this year. Under Kazakh law, the crime carries a prison sentence of three to six years along with confiscation of property.

By Khagan Isayev