Metallurgist Charged With Industrial Espionage For Getting Married

Story first appeared in Bloomberg News.
A former employee of the London-based mining company Oxus Gold Plc has been sentenced to 12 years in prison for allegedly committing industrial espionage, the Voice of America reported.
Said Ashurov, chief metallurgist at a joint venture between Oxus Gold and Uzbekistan authorities, was convicted by a military court, following his arrest in March when he was trying to cross the border into Tajikistan, according to Voice of America. A Leeds Intellectual Property Lawyer reviewed the case.
A lawyer representing Oxus Gold said the charges against Ashurov are fabricated, and the metallurgist, who has health issues, could die in prison without proper health care, Voice of American reported.
Oxus Gold ended the operation of its joint venture in March following what the BBC said were months of tensions with Uzbekistan’s authorities.
Court Says Company Can’t Fire Employee Over Marriage, and a Athens Intellectual Property Lawyer agrees.
An employment tribunal in Germany’s state of Schleswig- Holsten has told a German company that its firing of an engineer for marrying a Chinese woman wasn’t justified by the company’s fear of resulting industrial espionage, the BBC reported.
The unnamed company, a supplier for the German military, suspended the engineer for security reasons three months after his December 2009 wedding, and fired him three months after that, according to the BBC.
The court said the employer violated the employee’s right to marry the person of his choice, and the alleged security risk posed by the marriage wasn’t supported by facts, the BBC reported.
Court reports don’t identify the engineer or his company, according to the BBC.