James Giffen

James H. Giffen is an American businessman and an authority on American-Soviet trade.[1] He is the founder and chairman of Mercator Corporation.[2] He was the prime suspect accused in the $80 million Kazakhgate bribery scandal, which was at one time the largest US investigation ever into an overseas bribery case; but which went nowhere.[3][4]

Giffen has had ties to the USSR dating back to the 1970s. After graduating from college, he worked for a subsidiary of Armco Steel, developing a relationship with Armco boss and future US commerce secretary C. William Verity, Jr.[5] During the Cold War, Giffen was instrumental in setting up the multi-company American Trade Consortium (including large corporations such as RJR Nabisco, Chevron, Eastman Kodak, Johnson & Johnson and Archer Daniels Midland) to negotiate entry into the Soviet market with representatives of Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev.[6]

Kazakhgate trial

In the Kazakhgate trial, Giffen asserted that he was acting with the approval of the CIA, which refused to release secret papers relating to this activities.[7] His defense said Giffen had merely been following orders from the Kazakh government, which as a foreign state had the right to define legality according to its own views, and serving the interests of the United States.[8]

Giffen eventually pleaded guilty to a tax misdemeanor under anti-corruption laws; the other charges, which could have carried a penalty of several decades in prison, were dropped.[7] The case concluded in November 2010; U.S. District Judge William Pauley, who said he had been able to refer to classified documents that had not been made public in the trial, ordered neither prison time nor a fine for Giffen.[8]

Notes

  1. ↑ Claudia H. Deutsch, Taking a team approach to Soviet Trade, The New York Times, July 31, 1988
  2. ↑ Steve LeVine, The Oil and the Glory, Random House, 2007
  3. ↑ Terry Macalister, "Swiss join oil bribery inquiry", The Guardian, May 7, 2003.
  4. ↑ http://www.fcpablog.com/blog/2010/11/22/no-punishment-for-hero-giffen.html
  5. ↑ Ron Stodghill, "Oil, Cash and Corruption", The New York Times, November 5, 2006.
  6. ↑ Louis Kraar, "Top US Companies Move Into Russia", Fortune, July 31, 1989
  7. 1 2 http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/northamerica/usa/7943201/George-Clooney-film-inspiration-Mr-Kazakhstan-finally-brought-to-justice.html
  8. 1 2 http://foreignpolicy.com/2010/11/19/was-james-giffen-telling-the-truth/
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