{"id":1523,"date":"2015-06-15T11:11:21","date_gmt":"2015-06-15T11:11:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/covcasbulletin.info\/?p=1523"},"modified":"2015-06-16T11:51:33","modified_gmt":"2015-06-16T11:51:33","slug":"the-mansion-on-the-heath","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/covcasbulletin.info\/?p=1523","title":{"rendered":"The Mansion on the Heath"},"content":{"rendered":"

By IGGY OSTANIN, with reports by ELEANOR ROSE (OCCRP) and KARIM SECKER
\nOrganized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP), The Khadija Project
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Ilham Aliyev\u2019s family owns a 10,500-square-foot London mansion worth more than US$ 25 million.<\/p>\n

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The house is on Hampstead Lane, in a leafy corner of North London \u2013 a cool oasis from the bustle of the central tourist zone. The red-brick building stands behind an imposing security gate, hidden from prying eyes by thick hedges. The curtains in its large windows are drawn, and the driveway stands empty save for a couple of service personnel who come and go in a battered Fiat Punto.<\/p>\n

It is an old neighborhood, and a rich one.<\/p>\n

Just across the street stands the baronial Kenwood House, an enormous wedding-cake-style structure built in the 17th century, which was once owned by William Murray, first Earl of Mansfield.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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It overlooks the rugged green expanse of Hampstead Heath, a kind of wild urban park whose landscapes inspired the great English Romantic poet John Keats.<\/p>\n

Nearby, the quaint villages of Belsize Park and Hampstead are home to the great and good of the British liberal cultural scene such as Liam Gallagher and Benedict Cumberbatch. In recent years, to the chagrin of long-time residents, oligarchs have bought up expensive properties in the area. In the booming real estate market of London, where house prices leapt by nearly 26 percent between 2013 and 2014 alone, these houses are fantastic investments for the super-rich.<\/p>\n

The house was purchased in 1998 when Aliyev was a vice-president of Azerbaijan\u2019s State Owned Oil Company (SOCAR). It\u2019s unknown how much the purchase price was, or how much he was getting paid back then.<\/p>\n

Land Registry records for the Hampstead Lane house, dubbed the \u201cMansion on the Heath\u201d by its architects, show that it is owned by Beckforth Services Limited, a company in turn owned by the Aliyevs and registered in the Isle of Man, an offshore tax haven.<\/p>\n

Today Ilham Aliyev is the President of Azerbaijan, and the Mansion on the Heath is just one of multiple pied-a-terres used by the Aliyev family, which also maintains domiciles in Moscow and Baku.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Today as president, Aliyev\u2019s salary is about US$ 230,000 per year, raising an interesting question: how can he possibly afford such a large house in one of London\u2019s most expensive neighborhoods?<\/p>\n

President Aliyev can rightly say that the Mansion on the Heath is no longer his house as documents for Beckforth Services Limited reveal that he and his wife, Mehriban, transferred their shares in 2010 to their eldest daughter, Leyla Aliyeva, who is now the sole shareholder.<\/p>\n

There is no indication in the paperwork of any money changing hands in the deal.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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But the Beckforth records do show another interesting anomaly: the elder Aliyevs used the address<\/a> of the Azerbaijani State Owned Oil Company (SOCAR) as their personal address.<\/p>\n

Nice as the London neighborhood and house may be, they apparently weren\u2019t quite nice enough. According to the website of high-end architects SHH, the firm was retained to enlarge and redecorate the property, although it had just been refurbished prior to the sale.<\/p>\n

The architects claim that their client, “a central Asian diplomatic family”<\/em><\/strong>, asked for “a sense of grandeur<\/a>, especially in the entrance area”<\/em><\/strong>. The Aliyevs<\/mark> are said to have insisted on a design that made “particular reference to French influences and interiors from the Cote d’Azur region.\u201d<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Planning permission records from the London borough of Haringey reveal that the Aliyevs\u2019 Beckforth Services Limited commissioned SHH to engage in \u201carchitectural refurbishment\u201d on the Hampstead house. This included enlarging the master suite<\/a> and building underground parking lifts.<\/p>\n

The Aliyevs\u2019 neighborhood is one of London\u2019s wealthiest. One of the owners of the Arsenal football club, Alisher Usmanov, owns a house<\/a> down the block, which he bought in 2008 for \u00a350 million (US$76 million).<\/p>\n

Although the exact value of the Aliyevs’ London property is not clear, their next door neighbor’s house was worth more than US$ 26 million<\/a> two years ago. The Hampstead mansion is likely to be worth significantly more after the work performed by SHH, whose clients include wealthy Saudis<\/a> and fashion designer Tom Ford<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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The Isle of Man Company<\/strong><\/p>\n

The Aliyevs did not directly buy the Hampstead mansion in 1998, but used Beckforth Services Limited to acquire it<\/a>.
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