BBC Report Cost Donor Knighthood and Peerage, Court Told

A 2021 BBC report on the Pandora Papers cost political donor Mohamed Amersi a knighthood and a peerage, according to testimony presented to the High Court on Wednesday. Amersi is suing the broadcaster over a Panorama episode titled Pandora Papers: Political Donors Exposed and a related online article that remains published.

Amersi’s barrister, Oliver Powell, stated that the coverage caused very serious harm to his client. He argued that the program’s claim that Amersi was involved in corrupt deals while working for Swedish telecoms company Telia went to the heart of his reputation and integrity. Powell read from a witness statement in which Amersi said the resulting scandal forced him to step back from his educational philanthropy.

The donor, who gave 25,000 pounds to Reform UK last year and previously donated hundreds of thousands to the Conservative Party, also said Union Bancaire Privée of Switzerland closed his bank accounts. Powell told the court these financial and social consequences resulted directly from the allegations that Amersi knew or should have known about corrupt payments.

The BBC is defending the material on the grounds of truth and public interest. In its written defense, the broadcaster argued there is no evidence Amersi suffered serious reputational harm. It stated that no corroborating documentary evidence supporting his assertions has been disclosed and suggested his statement contains factual inaccuracies.

The 2021 reporting focused on Amersi’s role as an adviser to Telia, then called TeliaSonera, in Uzbekistan. It centered on a 220 million dollar payment made in January 2010 to a Gibraltar company called Takilant. The BBC’s case is that the real beneficial owner of Takilant was Gulnara Karimova, the eldest daughter of Uzbekistan’s president, who allegedly had influence over the country's telecoms regulator.

Amersi argues that neither he nor Telia knew or suspected Karimova’s ownership. He maintains his work in Uzbekistan was very limited, lasting fewer than six weeks in December 2009 and 2010, and that no contemporaneous evidence shows he should have known of her alleged ownership. Powell criticized the BBC for relying on admissions Telia made to the US Department of Justice in a 2017 deferred prosecution agreement. He described those admissions as untested hearsay that deserve little or no weight.

Powell cited a legal review commissioned by Telia, which interviewed Amersi and was unable to determine with any certainty that there was a legal or financial connection between Takilant and Karimova. The BBC alleged Telia entered into a series of corrupt deals in Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, and Nepal. Amersi says the broadcaster produced no evidence of his knowledge or involvement in corruption in any of those countries.

Amersi is seeking damages, including aggravated damages, and an injunction to stop further publication of the statements he says are defamatory. Powell told the court the BBC was offering inference and generalized suspicion rather than an evidential foundation. He claimed the broadcaster seriously misled viewers by suggesting Amersi was centrally involved in paying a bribe to Karimova. Amersi is due to give evidence for six days starting 11 November.