In April 2023, when he was serving as deputy head of the Presidential Safety Service, Otabek Umarov – Uzbek President Shavkat Mirziyoyev’s son-in-law – reportedly acquired citizenship within the United Arab Emirates. He’s additionally alleged to be the proprietor of round $7 million price of Dubai actual property.
These are the central allegations of a brand new investigation revealed by the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Challenge (OCCRP) and RFE/RL’s Uzbek Service, Ozodlik.
Underneath Uzbek army regulation, which governs the place Umarov held on the time, holding a second citizenship is prohibited. Since buying citizenship usually contains swearing an oath of allegiance, many nations bar safety (and different) officers from doing so – a second passport represents doable divided loyalties and a counterintelligence danger.
As OCCRP and Ozodlik reported, “Underneath UAE regulation, foreigners can solely receive citizenship via a nomination by a royal court docket or senior official, and [the process] requires swearing an oath of allegiance to the Emirates.”
Umarov was shifted out of his safety service function in November 2024, within the prolonged wake of the assassination try on Komil Allamjanov.
Allamjanov, on the time of the October 2024 try, had just lately stepped down from his function as deputy head of the presidential administration. He has since returned to authorities service, as an adviser to the highly effective head of the presidential administration, Saida Mirziyoyeva (the president’s eldest daughter). As of January 2026 he was additionally appointed to a seemingly bespoke function: advisor-ambassador and consultant of the presidential administration in the USA.
Umarov, in the meantime, was named first deputy chairman of Uzbekistan’s Nationwide Olympic Committee – his father-in-law, the president, is the chairman.
In accordance with OCCRP and Ozodlik, sooner or later in 2025, Umarov grew to become the proprietor of 13 properties in Dubai, price round $7 million. The properties beforehand belonged to his youthful brother, Oybek Umarov, who bought them in 2021 and 2022, in response to leaked Dubai actual property knowledge obtained by OCCRP.
It isn’t clear exactly how or after they got here to be listed with Umarov’s identify on the deeds, whether or not the properties have been gifted or bought.
Whereas Umarov has notably costly tastes – for instance, he’s been pictured sporting a restricted version Richard Mille watch valued at as much as $1.9 million – his authorities place doesn’t fairly clarify his obvious wealth. Uzbek officers do not need to reveal their revenue declarations publicly.
OCCRP and Ozodlik reported, “Public business registries present no document of [Otabek Umarov] proudly owning personal firms throughout his time as deputy presidential safety chief.” His brother, nonetheless, does have in depth enterprise holdings, together with in banking, cement, and metalwork.
A high-ranking authorities supply instructed The Diplomat in late 2024 that Umarov’s property and companies have been held within the names of others, together with Ulugbek Shadmanov who was implicated in an obvious try to control the U.S. sanctions system to focus on Allamjonov and one other Uzbek official within the months earlier than the assassination try. Shadmanov was earlier named within the Pandora Papers as related to an offshore firm, although there are few particulars obtainable. In December 2024 he was detained in Dubai and extradited quickly – apparently with out the correct authorized course of – to Uzbekistan, no matter the truth that he held what’s often known as a “Golden Visa” within the UAE. Regardless of high-powered authorized illustration and a marketing campaign on his behalf, little or no has been reported since about his case.
Finally, the OCCRP and Ozodlik investigation raises much more questions than it solutions; that’s the character of investigations into the opaque underbelly of Uzbek politics (and people of the UAE, in addition). As I instructed Ozodlik, we don’t know precisely how Umarov acquired UAE citizenship, who was concerned, and who knew about it. As famous above, the method to acquired UAE citizenship necessitates a nomination by a royal court docket or senior official. It’s almost unimaginable to consider that Umarov’s function and connections have been unknown on the time to the UAE’s authorities.
Then there are questions of what comes subsequent. Uzbekistan doesn’t formally acknowledge twin citizenship. Holding a second citizenship isn’t unlawful per se – although it does violate legal guidelines associated to Umarov’s particular place on the time. Nonetheless, “voluntarily buying a passport of a international state” is listed as doable grounds for revocation of Uzbek citizenship.