Kozeny ordered extradited from Bahamas

Magistrate Carolita Bethell ruled that prosecutors had enough evidence to extradite Viktor Kozeny, who holds Irish, Venezuelan, Brazilian and Grenadian passports.

Kozeny's defense lawyer, Clive Nichols, said he will appeal the decision. It's not clear when Kozeny, who has three final avenues of appeal, could be extradited.

Kozeny was indicted in October 2005 on 27 counts of bribery in U.S. District Court in Manhattan under the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, which makes it a crime to offer payment to foreign government officials to obtain or retain business.

The indictment said Kozeny and two other men tried to buy off senior officials from the former Soviet republic of Azerbaijan.

Azerbaijan, rich in oil resources, began privatizing some of its state-owned enterprises in the 1990s. The defendants tried to bribe key decision makers and corrupt the privatization process, according to U.S. prosecutors.

Tens of millions of dollars were paid in bribes in the scheme from 1997 to about 1999, prosecutors said.

Kozeny was arrested last October at his mansion in the exclusive gated Bahamian community of Lyford Cay, and has since been held in prison. AP

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