In January 2026, an international arbitration tribunal in London upheld Kazakhstan’s core claims against the Karachaganak Petroleum Operating consortium – including Shell, Eni, Chevron, and Lukoil – over unlawfully reimbursed costs under its production-sharing agreement. The compensation figure: between $2 and $4 billion. In its written decision, the tribunal cited Kazakhstan’s own admission that the country had tolerated “corruption and kleptocracy” until 2022. Meanwhile, at The Hague, Kazakhstan is pursuing a $160 billion claim against the Kashagan consortium, alleging that the state received just 2 percent of post-royalty revenue.
These are significant precedents. But behind the figures argued in London and The Hague lies a human cost that was not discussed before the court. Kazakhstani businesses were driven into bankruptcy by predatory subcontracting chains, and oil workers spent years doing some of the most dangerous work in the country’s most profitable industry – and were paid a fraction of what the contracts above them prescribed.
The schemes that defrauded the state and the schemes that defrauded the workers were manifestations of the same system. That raises an uncomfortable question about the arbitration: who are these victories actually for?
