Côte d’Azur: Behind a luxury villa, Azerbaijani interests

investigation

As part of “The Baku connection” project, the investigative journalism network Forbidden Stories and FRANCE 24 investigated the Santa Monica Villa in Villefranche-sur-Mer and the strange financial schemes that allowed Azerbaijanis, including a powerful businessman, to buy themselves one of the most beautiful views on the Côte d’Azur in the south of France.


Issued on: 08/11/2024 - 
By: Sébastian SEIBT  FRANCE24/AFP

As part of an investigation with the investigative journalism consortium Forbidden Stories, FRANCE 24 looked into the link between a property on the Côte d'Azur and a wealthy Azerbaijani businessman. 

© France Médias Monde graphics studio

Move along, there’s nothing to see? Today, number 2 Boulevard de Suède looks more like wasteland than the site of what was one of the grandest villas overlooking the Côte d’Azur in Villefranche-sur-Mer, close to Nice.

A stone’s throw from the famous Villa la Léopolda – one of the most expensive residences in the world which belonged to the King of Belgium and in which Alfred Hitchcock filmed part of “To Catch a Thief” – the real estate no-man’s-land on 2 Boulevard de Suède is out-of-place and intriguing.

It hasn’t always been this way. Uncovering the mystery hidden at this address, which has ripple effects as far away as Baku, Azerbaijan, means plunging into the story of a home – the Santa Monica villa – which was worth nearly six million euros.

It's a story that brings together banks and opaque financial arrangements in Luxembourg, a PO box near the Louis II stadium in the heart of Monaco, and figures from the highest echelons of economic and political power in Azerbaijan.

Map of France showing the location of Villefrance-sur-Mer in the south of France. © FRANCE 24

A mysterious company in Monaco

It was an Azerbaijani journalist, working for independent media outlet Abzas, who first started investigating the Santa Monica villa. He was seeking to understand how a former local government official for the Azerbaijani administration, Panah Jahangirov, and his spouse Reyhan Huseynova, could have become the owners of a residence worth €5.8 million in 2008. He also wanted to know what was hidden behind Boulevard Side, the public-limited company based in Monaco which, in 2019, bought the villa in one of the Côte d’Azur’s most popular holiday destinations – and then destroyed it.

Continuing his work, investigative journalism network Forbidden Stories collaborated with FRANCE 24, Abzas Media, the Organised Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP) and Luxembourgish weekly newspaper D’Lëtzbuerger for this investigation.

They discovered that the real owner of the Santa Monica villa is currently Shahin Movsumov, a powerful Azerbaijani businessman who is head of the AS Group conglomerate and also the brother of Shahmar Movsumov, one of Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev’s closest economic advisors.

Contacted directly and via his business, Movsumov did not respond to a request by Forbidden Stories to answer questions.

Shahin Movsumov is also behind Boulevard Side. The Monegascan law company, created in 2019, allowed him to buy the villa without his name appearing on the property deeds.

Monaco is well known for its business laws, which guarantee a high degree of confidentiality, but Movsumov is listed as the owner of 2 Boulevard de Suède on a building permit to construct a new villa on the site submitted in 2020, that was shown to FRANCE 24. His ownership was also confirmed by Philippe Mialon, an architect from Nice, who the Azerbaijani businessman commissioned to design plans for his future residence on the site.

Little surprise that the address appealed to Movsumov. “It’s an exceptional site that has one of the most beautiful views of the bay in Villefranche-sur-Mer and the Côte d’Azur,” said Mialon.

A 3,547 m² vacant lot in the heart of the royal quarter

The Santa Monica villa and its outbuildings, which at their most expansive covered 3,547 m², are steeped in history. The Boulevard de Suède – Boulevard of Sweden in English – got its name, in part, because of the residence at number 2.

Carl Florman, co-founder of Scandinavian Airlines, was one of its former owners. “We were told that he hosted the King of Sweden in his house on multiple occasions and there was talk of naming the street in his honour, reflecting other roads in the neighbourhood named after monarchs [including Léopold II et Édouard VII]. But he didn’t want to show off and preferred that the road be named Boulevard de Suède,” said Manfred Ramin, a German orchestral conductor who lived in the house with his wife, an opera singer, from 1984-2008.

The musical couple sold the property to local government official Jahangirov and his spouse Huseynova – but not directly. “It was our neighbour, Eldar Garibov, another Azerbaijani expat, who put us in contact,” said Ramin. Contacted at his business address and via close associates, Garibov did not respond to a request by Forbidden Stories to comment on his role in this transaction.

Images showing the grounds of the Santa Monica villa with the former residence in 2004 and as an empty lot in 2024. 

© Manfred Ramin, Sebastian Seibt, FRANCE 24

Garibov is not unknown in Baku: he is the director of Unibank, one of Azerbaijan’s major banks.

A source who preferred to remain anonymous told FRANCE 24 that the banker was the “boss” of a small circle of Azerbaijani nationals living close together in Villefranche.

As well as Garibov, who owned the Floriana villa on Boulevard Léopold II, there was also another Azerbaijani businessman, linked to a villa on Boulevard de Suède, the same street as the Santa Monica villa, which was bought by Huseynova et Jahangirov, thanks to Garibov.

Officially, the Santa Monica villa was not bought in 2008 by the couple, but by Santa Monica Investment, a limited liability company based in Nice. Ramin remembers meeting the two Azerbaijanis before the sale – Huseynova was a “big music lover”, he said – but there is no trace of their names on the property deeds.

The company's shares were not transferred to Jahangirov and his wife until 2011, three years after the initial transaction, marking the first in a series of bizarre legal and financial arrangements that followed the acquisition of 2 boulevard de Suède by the Azerbaijani couple.

From Azerbaijan to Villefranche, via Luxembourg

Why, for instance, did the Azerbaijanis use a limited liability company originally set up by a company in Luxembourg, which was itself registered by three other entities located in the Duchy in order to buy a house in the south of France?

Most of the bankers and notaries linked to this convoluted arrangement are also involved in other opaque financial operations which pass through Luxembourg. To cite one example, our investigation identified Jean Bodoni, former director of a subsidiary of Dexia-BIL bank (Dexia in Luxembourg), whose name featured prominently in the Panama Papers scandal.

When asked by Forbidden Stories, Bodoni said he did not remember the Azerbaijani couple. Unsurprisingly, he did remember the three entities, all linked to Dexia bank, used to found Santa Monica Investment. Koffour S.A., Valon S.A. and Lannage S.A. created hundreds of other anonymous companies in Luxembourg used by wealthy customers to carry out opaque transactions. “On the face of it, if an Azerbaijani resident wants to buy a property in France, there is no reason to establish a company in Luxembourg. Unless they want to hide something such as their identity, or in the context of planning their inheritance,” Bodoni said.

People may take this step for straightforward confidentiality reasons, such as not wanting the extent of their wealth to be public knowledge. But “using multiple companies and fronts to hide the identity of the beneficial owner of a transaction [such as the purchase of real estate] is a potential indicator of corruption", said Margot Mollat, Senior Policy Manager at Transparency International. Our investigation could not establish the reasons that the Azerbaijani couple chose to base their financial arrangements in Luxembourg.

The Dexia-BIL bank loaned Huseynova and Jahangirov almost the entire sale price for the property – some €5.5 million for a villa costing €5.8 million. Seemingly, quite a risk on the bank’s part. “It must have estimated that they had sufficient guarantees,” Badoni said.

Family ties, business interests

Jahangirov does not appear to be a major player in Baku's political and economic scene. His highest-profile role was in the public department for Inter-Ethnic Relations, Religious Affairs and Multiculturalism from at least 2015 to 2019. Our investigation was unable to determine where he has worked since then.

Jahangirov did not respond to a request by Forbidden Stories to answer questions.

His wife has a more prestigious resume. People who met her described her to FRANCE 24 and Forbidden Stories as “very cultured", “a Francophile” and said she possesses “a certain influence”. She comes from a well-known family in Azerbaijan, where family status is of high importance. Her father, the politician Kamran Huseynov, had a documentary made about him in 2013 to celebrate his 100th birthday. Her sister, Hijran Huseynova, followed in her father’s footsteps by entering politics and was elected an MP for the presidential party in 2020. She was also awarded France’s Legion of Honour in 2010.

The youngest daughter, Reyhan Huseynova, has also been decorated by French officials. In 2016 she was awarded the Legion of Honour, followed by the Order of Academic Palms distinguished Officer’s award in 2021.

Would this be enough to reassure the Dexia-BIL bank? Perhaps bankers also saw value in Jahangirov. At the time of the villa’s purchase he was the administrator for Consolidated Equipments, a company in Luxembourg specialising in the cotton trade, a post he held until 2010.

Was this a profitable business for Jahangirov? Perhaps. Especially as Jahangirov sat at the head of this company with Khagani Bashirov, a Franco-Azerbaijani businessman who is now at the heart of several legal investigations, notably in Azerbaijan and Luxembourg. Bashirov, who handled large sums of money, was imprisoned from 2010-2011 for embezzling funds from the International Bank of Azerbaijan.

Bashirov told FRANCE 24 and Forbidden Stories that he remembered Jahangirov as a “businessman” who dedicated a large portion of his career to the cotton trade.

Jahangirov, the cotton “specialist”, left Consolidated Equipments in 2010 – at the same time scandals broke out tarnishing Bashirov’s reputation – but not necessarily to start a new life on the Côte d’Azur.

The architects’ waltz

It is difficult to know if the Azerbaijani couple often visited the Santa Monica villa after they bought it. Huseynova posted photos on Facebook that match up with views from the property’s grounds in 2013 and 2017 and a source who interacted with them confirmed to FRANCE 24 that they had seen them multiple times at the site.

Other sources, who preferred to remain anonymous, said their visits were much more sporadic. The couple’s acquisition of the villa may have been the equivalent of a “foreign bank account”, said a source linked to the villa, who wished to remain anonymous.

Buying a property can “provide a safe haven for part of one's wealth and for oneself in the event of a change of leadership in one of these unstable regimes”, explains Mollat.

In any case the couple seemed to have hopes of renovating or reconstructing the villa and its outhouses. When the musicians Ramin and his wife lived in the villa, the large main house was covered in flowers and the inside was styled with flashy, outdated interior design. A path through the gardens led to a smaller guesthouse below, with a view of a 130 m² swimming pool.

Images showing the main house, garden and bathroom at the Santa Monica villa in 2004. © Manfred Ramin, FRANCE 24

But the property “was a bit of a hodgepodge, and if you wanted a house that was more contemporary it would be hard to achieve with what was already there”, said an anonymous source.

Over the years, several architects have worked on plans for 2 Boulevard de Suède. At least three different companies have been used, FRANCE 24 found.

There was talk of a multi-storey house, constructing a large car park and an underground passage linked to the main house by a system of elevators. Such projects would have cost millions of euros, according to estimations by architects contacted by FRANCE 24.
Shahin Movsumov, the man behind Santa Monica villa?

Huseynova and her husband would probably not have had access to such vast sums of money, leading to the final twist in the tale of the Santa Monica villa: Shahin Movsumov, the powerful boss of AS Group was the real owner of the property in Villefranche-sur-Mer. He entered the scene well before the property was bought by Boulevard Side in 2019. His name appears on a construction permit, shown to FRANCE 24, submitted to architecture firm Mialon in 2016.

Images showing the swimming pool at the Santa Monica villa in 2004 and the architect's plans for renovations on the property in 2016. © Manfred Ramin, FRANCE 24

It was Movsumov who, in 2014, contacted an architect and invited them to Baku to discuss his vision for the Santa Monica villa.

Movzumov’s purchase of the villa connects the property directly to the highest echelons of economic and political power in Azerbaijan. Movzumov is the brother of one of President Ilham Aliyev’s closest advisors and his conglomerate AS Group has managed major national construction projects.

One of AS Group's companies constructed the building which houses Azerbaijan’s state oil fund – a strategic construction for a country that depends largely on hydrocarbon exports.

Movzumov’s name also appeared in the Panama Papers, which listed him as the beneficiary of a company incorporated in the British Virgin Islands in 2012.

Shahin Movsumov approved plans for the future Santa Monica villa back in 2016, but did not start construction work. After the four-year validity period for the first permit expired, he filed the same permit a second time in 2020, and let it expire again. But this time, the existing property was razed to the ground. The last stones were removed in June 2024, according to a FRANCE 24 journalist who visited the site. All that remains, for now, is the beautiful view of the Côte d’Azur.

This article has been translated from the original in French.