Listen to the article
A major investigation by the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP) has identified a suspicious pattern in procurement tenders issued by the Almalyk Mining and Metallurgical Complex (AMMC), Uzbekistan’s largest state-owned mining and metals enterprise, over the past three years. Despite winning companies being registered across the United Kingdom, Georgia and Singapore, the OCCRP’s findings suggest they may all be connected to a single individual: Grigory Khvan, identified as the former Vice-President of the Uzbekistan Table Tennis Federation.
The AMMC, which was slated for a partial initial public offering in late 2025, awarded contracts exceeding $200 million to ten foreign companies. The investigation raises serious questions about transparency and the legitimacy of the procurement process at one of the country’s most strategically significant industrial assets.
Dormant companies, active contracts
Two UK-registered firms, Lemixton Solutions and Golders Business, together secured contracts worth approximately $35.5 million despite having declared themselves “dormant” to British authorities. Under UK law, dormant companies are prohibited from engaging in commercial activities or financial transactions without a valid justification.
Lemixton Solutions won at least 56 tenders worth $22.5 million since 2022. According to the OCCRP, the firm has only one employee, no official website and no physical office in Uzbekistan. Golders Business won contracts totalling $13 million and made more than 100 deliveries to the complex, yet consistently filed financial reports as a non-trading entity.
Registry changes follow journalist inquiries
When OCCRP journalists began contacting these firms in December 2025, what the investigation describes as “urgent and strange” backdated changes appeared in the UK Companies House registry. Records that had initially listed British nominees as owners were amended to show Khvan as the person with significant control, backdated to 2018. By January 2026, the records were altered again, this time transferring ownership to Felipe Guerrero, a Colombian citizen, also backdated to 2018.
The investigation further found that electronic signatures belonging to employees of MoreGroup, a UK accounting firm, appeared on at least 13 AMMC contracts. Wendy Mary Ann Conroy, whose facsimile signature appears on $6.2 million worth of Lemixton contracts, was removed as a controlling person just days before the most recent contract bearing her name was signed.
Former employee reports forged signature to police
Ruairi Laughlin-McCann, a former MoreGroup employee, discovered his signature on $1.4 million worth of Golders Business contracts. He told OCCRP he had had no involvement with the firm for five years and had “absolutely not signed” the documents in question. He has since reported the matter to the City of London Police and the UK Serious Fraud Office.
The OCCRP’s findings place the AMMC’s procurement practices under scrutiny at a sensitive moment. The complex had been positioned as a flagship asset in Uzbekistan’s privatisation programme, with a partial IPO planned for late 2025. The investigation does not establish whether AMMC management was aware of the alleged arrangements, and no charges have been reported in connection with the procurement contracts.