His ersatz brands - such as Business Club, Vigor, and President - are sold on illicit markets in Europe and war zones in Africa. Some of his business is legitimate: His Lebanon-based company, European Tobacco, has produced and distributed its own cigarette brands on at least three continents, including markets it is legally allowed to supply.īut public records, confidential industry reports, and interviews with Nasri’s former and current associates show that this is only one aspect of his business: The same supply chains are also used to run a booming trade in black-market cigarettes in countries as far-flung as Cameroon and Moldova. Like many cigarette smugglers, Nasri relied on contracts with the world’s biggest tobacco companies, who employed him in markets from Belarus to Azerbaijan. Reporters analyzed thousands of leaked corporate intelligence documents, corroborating details through interviews with over 20 tobacco industry figures, smugglers, and Nasri’s former partners and competitors. He has managed to maintain a low public profile despite striking partnerships with some of Iraq’s most powerful politicians.īut now, OCCRP has compiled one of the most detailed portraits of Nasri’s involvement in the illicit tobacco trade to date. Nasri, however, was never publicly linked to the trade. Reports in the 1990s and 2000s by international media and the World Health Organization highlighted the smuggling of black-market cigarettes in Iraq and the wider region. These include three linked to the operation Nasri built, OCCRP found. Industry sources estimate there are up to six illicit cigarette factories in operation in Iraq today. Nasri’s company has since shifted its focus away from cigarettes, but the infrastructure he developed in the 1990s and 2000s is still in action. ![]() Starting in the late 1980s, he built alliances with powerful political figures and monopolized the smuggling of black-market tobacco into Iraq before constructing a network of facilities to produce his own knock-off brands. Nasri, from Iraq’s Assyrian Christian minority, has come to be known as the “father” of Iraqi counterfeit cigarettes. It is used by all the military groups in the region, not all of which can be called terrorists, to finance their fighting.” ![]() But behind the scenes, he built an operation that still produces cigarettes for black markets across the Middle East, particularly neighboring Iran, nourishing an industry that funds organized crime, corrupt politicians and even militias.Īs a brief prepared by Adit, a French strategic intelligence company, put it: “The question of trade in cigarettes could seem a secondary question. Publicly, Nasri is a real estate tycoon, bankrolling shopping malls, residential complexes, and office high-rises in the Iraqi Kurdish capital Erbil. One of the most profitable illicit trades was in cigarettes, and Nasri was one of the most successful operators. With most basic commodities banned from being imported, smugglers could make fortunes circumventing the embargo and moving products into Iraq. ![]() But for Nizar Hanna Nasri, they were an opportunity. The tycoon’s real estate interests are intertwined with the Barzani family.įor most Iraqis, the sanctions of the 1990s were a nightmare.Nasri’s partners have included Iraqi Kurdistan’s ruling Barzani family, former Iraqi President Jalal Talabani, and Saddam Hussein’s son.Nasri’s brands are sold on illicit markets in Europe, the Sahel, the Middle East and Central Asia.OCCRP identified three active counterfeit cigarette factories in Iraq with links to Nasri.Nizar Hanna Nasri’s facilities have fed billions of cigarettes into black markets from Cameroon to Moldova.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
Details
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |