The International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) reporters have found out that Azerbaijan President Ilham Aliyev has offshore companies to conceal his shares in gold mining and London real estate.

Accordingly, relatives of the Azerbaijani president have used foundations and companies registered in Panama to hide his shares in gold mining companies and real estate market. This is said in an ICIJ press release, according to RBC news agency of Russia.

ICIJ has obtained the documents of Panama-based Mossack Fonseca law firm, which is suspected of establishing fake firms and corporate organizations to conceal asset owners. Even though the press release does not specify the makeup of the Aliyev family property, the Azerbaijani president was already at the ICIJ focus three years ago. At the time, the journalists had found out that he and his family have secret offshore companies.

According to the documents which are under the ICIJ disposal, in 2003, Aliyev and his wife, Mehriban Aliyeva, had purchased a company in the British Virgin Islands. Aliyev, who was noted as the director and co-owner of this company, was an MP at the time, but he became President of Azerbaijan in October of the same year. According to the ICIJ data, this company had a legitimate legal status until May 2004. In actual fact, Aliyev was violating the Azerbaijani law which prohibits the members of parliament and the president from engaging in business activities, the attorneys explained.

In 2008, according to the ICIJ data, Aliyev’s daughters, 19-year-old Arzu and 23-year-old Leyla, purchased Arbor Investments, LaBelleza Holdings Limited, and Harvard Management Limited companies likewise in the British Virgin Islands. The first company was “registered” under Arzu’s name, and the rest—Leyla’s. The respective business transaction was concluded two months after Aliyev’s reelection as President.

At the time, the ICIJ could not find out the type of activity of these companies, but it had noted that, apparently, the Azerbaijani leadership had made considerable efforts to hide these companies from the public.

The ICIJ had informed that the head of all these three companies is Azerbaijani entrepreneur Hassan Gozal. According to the ICIJ data, Gozal, together with his brother Abdolbari, had at least ten companies in  Intersun Holding, where Abdolbari was president and Hassan—vice president. According to the documents which are under the ICIJ disposal, Intersun had received several major contracts from Azerbaijan’s state-owned oil company, where Aliyev was first vice president before becoming President of Azerbaijan. In addition, the Gozal brothers’ companies had won state construction contracts in and around Azerbaijani capital city Baku, and totaling some $4.5 billion.