Pandora Papers: Tory party donor corruption link

Pandora papers show that Mohamed Amersi, a Tory party donor, was involved in corruption in Uzbekistan. Johnson says Amersi’s donations were vetted.

The Pandora Papers, uncovered by a team of international investigative journalists, reveal that Mohamed Amersi, a Tory party donor, was involved as a middle man when a Swedish telecoms firm, Telia, made what later turned out to be a corrupt payment to the ruling family of Uzbekistan, a Central Asian state.

Amersi is alleged to have played a role in a £162 million bribe to Gulnara Kaimova, the daughter of then president Islam Karimov.

Daniel Bruce, chief executive at Transparency International UK, said: “These allegations add further weight to the case to reform regulation of political donations in the UK. There is a clear and growing consensus that the current rules controlling the money in British politics are out-of-date and in need of urgent reform.

“Politics parties’ due diligence on major donations should go beyond the box-ticking exercise of simply finding the donor on the electoral roll. The rules already prevent parties from accepting the proven proceeds of crime or corruption, but donations that raise red flags should also be rejected out of principle. As well as introducing a cap on the amount an individual can give, political parties should carefully consider whether their donors adhere to the same values the party claims to hold,” he added, according to The Guardian.

However Prime Minister Boris Johnson has insisted all donations are vetted.

Speaking to reporters in Manchester he said, “I see that story today. But all I can say on that one is all these donations are vetted in the normal way in accordance with rules that were set up under a Labour government. So, we vet them the whole time.”

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