Uzbekistan has adopted a bill, still in its first reading, which prohibits banking operations in the country for sanctioned individuals and legal entities. Thus, the authorities of this country are trying to protect their financial system from secondary sanctions. The Moscow Times writes about this.
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The bill, which was prepared taking into account the experience of the Czech Republic, Latvia and Estonia, which joined the sanctions, gives additional powers to the country’s Central Bank.
Uzbekistan, which has become one of the hubs of the so-called “parallel import” to Russia and one of the main destinations “ card tourism” of Russian citizens, in the first year of the great war received more than 300 thousand Russians, of whom 60 thousand opened bank accounts.
At the same time, the volume of money transfers from Russia to Uzbekistan jumped by 160%, to a record $14, 5 billion (for 2022), and Russian entrepreneurs became record holders for the number of companies opened in the country.
But after repeated visits to Central Asia by officials from the EU and the USA, banks in Uzbekistan have tightened conditions for Russians.
“In fact, the adopted bill will only consolidate the already established practice: banks in Uzbekistan no longer conduct transactions with sanctioned persons,” said Denis Primakov, head of the Sanctions Law and Compliance practice at KIAP AB.
Lawyer and manager Alexander Aronov, partner at MCA Aronov and Partners, added that recently all payments between Russia and Uzbekistan have been poorly processed.