Yuki Gambaryan, wife of detained Binance official Tigran Gambaryan, has accused Nigerian authorities of illegally using someone in Kuje Prison as her sick husband’s next of kin.

In a statement on Friday, Mrs Gambaryan lamented the prolonged detention of her husband and his being “treated as a dangerous criminal and his basic human rights are being neglected” despite his deteriorating health.

“Since Tigran collapsed in court on May 23 with malaria, his health conditions have worsened, and Tigran now has pneumonia. Despite a court order by Justice Emeka Nwite to take Tigran to hospital immediately, it took the prison authorities 11 days to take him for a brief check-up.

“The prison is not allowing the results of this check-up at the hospital to be released to his family, lawyers, nor the U.S. embassy as they have named a person from the prison as his next of kin. Despite clear statements from Tigran and written requests from the Embassy, his lawyers and his wife Yuki to change this, nothing has been done,” Mrs Gambaryan said.

Peoples Gazette could not immediately get the Nigerian Correctional Service’s response to Mrs Gambaryan’s allegation as its spokesperson, Abubakar Umar, said he was in transit and could not talk at the moment when reached.

However, Mrs Gambaryan commended Nigerian authorities for dropping tax charges against her husband after the court hearing on Friday.

“I am glad the FIRS charges against Tigran have finally been dropped,” said Mrs Gambaryan. “This clearly shows that any issues between the Nigerian authorities and Binance can be resolved without holding my husband in prison.”

She added, “I sincerely hope the Nigerian authorities will now see how unnecessary it is to keep Tigran at Kuje. I am praying that they now swiftly drop the EFCC charges against him so that this nightmare can finally come to an end.”

FIRS’ decision to drop tax charges against Mr Gambaryan comes barely a week after sixteen Republican congressmen accused Nigerian authorities of holding Mr Gambaryan hostage to extort his employer, Binance.

In a letter to President Joe Biden dated June 4, the lawmakers said the charges against Mr Gambaryan were baseless and constituted a coercion tactic by the Tinubu government to extort Binance. However, Mr Tinubu’s government denied holding Mr Gambaryan hostage.

Accusing Binance of illegal operation in Nigeria and fuelling the country’s economic crisis, Minister of Information Mohammed Idris said, “At all stages, due process has been followed, and prosecutors are confident of their case, based on the facts and evidence gathered.”

Mr Gambaryan and his colleague, Nadeem Anjarwalla, both flew into Nigeria in February for a meeting with National Security Adviser Nuhu Ribadu amid the country’s clampdown on cryptocurrency platforms on claims that they aid currency speculators damaging the naira.

Though Mr Anjarwalla, Binance’s Africa regional manager, escaped from the NSA custody on March 22 and fled the country, Mr Gambaryan has remained in custody facing trial over money laundering charges.

Since the federal government commenced a clampdown on cryptocurrency, blocking Binance’s website to its Nigerian users, the crypto trading giant disabled its P2P function and exited the Nigerian market.

Similarly, other cryptocurrency trading platforms, OKX and KuCoin, have disabled their P2P functions for Nigerian users and delisted naira on their platforms.