The son-in-law of Kazakhstan's autocratic president has appealed to Austrian authorities not to extradite him back to his homeland to face kidnapping charges, a magazine reported on Saturday.
In an interview with the weekly Profil that will appear on newsstands today, Rakhat Aliyev said he hopes to obtain Austrian citizenship and contends his life would be in danger if he is returned to the former Soviet republic.
"Austria must not deliver me to a system under which my life and the lives of my family are endangered," he was quoted as saying.
Federal police spokesman Gerald Hesztera said Aliyev, who was the Kazakh ambassador to Austria before he was dismissed last weekend, was arrested on Friday for alleged involvement in the suspected kidnappings of two senior managers of a bank he controls.
Austrian officials were to decide by yesterday afternoon whether to extradite Aliyev or release him on bail.
Aliyev remained hospitalized on Saturday after complaining of chest pains shortly after being taken into custody, said Gerhard Jarosch, a spokesman for the Vienna public prosecutor's office.
Rights group Amnesty International urged Austrian authorities on Saturday not to send Aliyev back, citing persistent and "frightening" allegations of torture and the country's death penalty.
"We raise our voices against extradition," said Heinz Patzelt, who runs Amnesty's Austria office.
Aliyev said he believes his father-in-law, President Nursultan Nazarbayev, issued the international warrant for his arrest because he had publicly challenged Nazarbayev and had declared his intentions to challenge him for the presidency in 2012.
"The president told me over and over: 'This is my country. Aliyev said.
Everyone does what I want, and you are the only one who does not obey me,"' Aliyev told Profil.
"Right now, we are presenting an image which confirms all the cliches in the film Borat," the magazine quoted him as saying.
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