Edited sentence: Ablyazov maintains BTA’s collapse was caused by Kazakhstan’s decision to forcibly nationalize a healthy bank.BTA Bank alleges Ablyazov assembled a complex network of offshore companies in which to house assets and capital once the purview of BTA siphoning as much as $15 billion in assets out of Kazakhstan between 2005 and 2009 – of which $4 billion, as of December 2013, has been proven in court.BTA Bank was nationalized in February 2009 at the height of the financial crisis and restructured on two further occasions (2009-2010, and 2012), and lost its creditors and the Kazakh state billions of dollars.He also insists this trial is a political power play due to Ablyazov’s previous involvement in the Democratic Choice of Kazakhstan (DCK), and that the trial was an elaborate way of publicly shaming a potential political opponent and to deny Ablyazov the right to run for public office.That figure will likely rise past $6 billion.The bank claimed it had failed because Ablyazov, during his five years as chairman, transformed it from a profitable and credible regional lender into a de-facto Ponzi scheme, starting with small amounts of money but rising quickly.” Nazarbayev’s reaction was swift, stripping away most of his assets (but not, it seems, his stake in BTA) and dispatching him to a Kazakh jail