Tigran Gambaryan is heading home after months of incarceration. The executive for Binance Holdings Ltd. was being held by the Nigerian government.
The United States and Nigerian governments have been negotiating his case, and those talks have finally resulted in him being sent on a plane to the US this week. While Gambaryan was in jail, his health worsened as he was held in the capital city Abuja, and he has been released from incarceration for humanitarian reasons.
The US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan who worked on the negotiations said that he is grateful to his colleagues in Nigeria for how productive the discussions have been and how they were finally able to arrive at Mr. Gambaryan’s release.
Gambaryan was being held because of his work for Binance. He had entered Nigeria in order to discuss the government banning Binance from the country and charging them severe fines for what the government there alleged were illegal activities. On Wednesday, the charges against Gambaryan were dropped by the Nigerian authorities, and he was allowed to leave on a plane bound for the United States.
The Case
Gambaryan was charged with currency manipulation and money laundering as a Biance employee in Nigeria. The government was holding him responsible for the actions of his employers, which is allowed under their law. The Nigerian government said that Biance intended to undermine the Nigerian currency with their actions and create economic decline.
Bince as a company is still facing charges, and the Nigerian government is still pursuing legal action against them. The case started back in February when the Nigerian government held both Gambaryan and one of the Biance African regional managers, Nadeem Anjarwalla. Later, Anjarwalla made his escape while Gambaryan was still detained.
Since then, Binance has been reaching out to the US government and the Nigerian government, pleading for Gambaryan’s release. The company’s CEO Richard Teng said that the Nigerian government asked him for a bribe to have the charges dropped. This is a claim that the Nigerian government denies.
Once the US government got involved, they kept Binance employees out of the talks and negotiated for the release on their own.
