Unaoil

Allegations of bribery

In 2010 Unaoil entered into an agreement with Leighton Holdings with the aim of securing a $500 million oil pipeline contract in Iraq. In 2011 Leighton Holdings referred the deal to the police as corruption. In 2014 a UK High Court judge dismissed the corruption claims.

In March 2016 Unaoil was again accused of facilitating corruption and bribery in the oil industry. A leaked cache of emails dating from 2001 to 2012 sent within Unaoil were the subject of a series of investigative articles published by Fairfax Media in the Australian newspaper The Age, and The Huffington Post in March 2016. Under headlines such as "Unaoil: World's Biggest Bribe Scandal" and "Unaoil: Company that Bribed the World", The Age wrote that "How they make their money is simple. Oil-rich countries often suffer poor governance and high levels of corruption. Unaoil's business plan is to play on the fears of large Western companies that they cannot win contracts without its help. Its operatives then bribe officials in oil-producing nations to help these clients win government-funded projects. The corrupt officials might rig a tender committee. Or leak inside information. Or ensure a contract is awarded without a competitive tender".

In Iraq Unaoil was alleged to have paid "multi-million dollar lump sums" to senior politicians. Other oil producing countries that Unaoil have dealings in include Iran, Libya, Syria, Yemen, Kuwait, and the UAE.

In March 2016 The Sydney Morning Herald published a letter from a legal representative of Unaoil in which the allegations of corruption and bribery are denied.

On 31 March 2016, Monaco authorities announced that they had raided the offices of Unaoil and the homes of some of its executives, following an urgent request for assistance from the UK's Serious Fraud Office. The statement said, "These searches and interviews were carried out in the presence of British officials as part of a vast, international corruption scandal implicating numerous foreign oil industry firms. The information collected is going to be examined by the British authorities as part of their investigation". As of the same day Unaoil found itself under a joint investigation by the U.S. Department of Justice, FBI, the U.K. National Crime Agency and Australian Federal Police.

On 27 February 2017, an article in the News Corp-owned The Australian presented an alternative perspective on the Unaoil bribery scandal. This claimed that the Fairfax Media newspapers had settled claims made against them regarding false allegations, and indicated that "Within weeks, the publisher will be confronted with yet another legal action, this time from the company at the centre of the allegations that triggered these backdowns. That company is Unaoil, a Monaco-based business that is a player in the international oil industry and is owned by the Ashani family." The article claimed that the leaker was an extortionist who had hacked Unaoil emails, and stated that Unaoil would seek through court to identify the sources for the 2016 articles. The Australian had previously reported Unaoil's denials of the allegations, and accusation that it was the victim of extortion, on 17 May 2016. Neither of these articles suggested that the content of the leaked emails upon which the earlier allegations had been based was inaccurate or forged.

Most popular media outlets appear to have decided not to report on the Unaoil allegations; something that one outlet suggested implied a deliberate strategy