SW Holdings

SW Holdings is an Azerbaijani holding company. SW Holdings has acquired almost all the companies formerly owned by AZAL, Azerbaijan's state airline.

SW Holdings is the sole contractor on large projects worth a total of $150 million.

Subsidiaries

SW Holdings enjoys a monopoly over almost every aspect of airline service in Azerbaijan. SW Holdings owns:

• Sky Catering, which provides in-flight meals.
• Airport Gate, which provides taxi service.
• Silkway Technics, which provides technical upkeep of planes and helicopters.

SW Holdings also owns its own bank, Silk Way Bank.

Ownership

SW Holdings has come under scrutiny for its ownership by politically connected families.

Arzu Aliyeva

One of Silk Way Bank's owners is Arzu Aliyeva, the daughter of President Ilham Aliyev and First Lady Mehriban Aliyeva.

Arzu paid 6.4 million manats ($7.8 million U.S. dollars) to acquire her stake of 29 percent in Silk Way Bank. It is not clear where she got that money from.

Zarifa Hamzayeva

Another of its owners is Zarifa Hamzayeva, the wife of the president of AZAL.

History

In 2003, Azerbaijan's Ministry of Economic Development drafted A Plan to privatize AZAL and its holdings (which includes another bank, AZAL Bank).

State law prescribed that the State Committee on Privatization of State Property must conduct the privatization. However, no evidence exists showing that the privatization was handled by the committee. The committee’s spokesperson, Gulu Khalilov, told Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty that he had no information on who privatized AZAL Bank.