No provisions for “equivalent offence” in extradition law – AG

Attorney General and Legal Affairs Minister Anil Nandlall, SC, had made it clear that Guyana’s extradition laws do not contain any provisions for an equivalent offence to be committed here in order for a person to be extradited overseas to face charges.

“There is no equivalent of Guyana offences in the extradition law,” AG Nandlall contended in response to claims made by attorneys representing United States-indicted businessmen, Azruddin and Nazar Mohamed, who are challenging an extradition request for them to face fraud and other charges in a Florida court.
One of the Mohameds’ lawyers, Roysdale Forde, SC, recently blamed the magistrate presiding over the extradition hearing for not giving the defence sufficient time to study the equivalent of the Guyana offence against the Mohameds.
The Attorney General cited Section Five of the Fugitive Offenders Act, explaining that it provides for the committed act to amount to an offence and not an equivalent offence.
According to the Act at Section 5 (1), “For the purpose of this Act, an offence of which a person is accused or has been convicted in Guyana or any Commonwealth country or Treaty Territory shall be an extraditable offence, where the act or omission constituting the offence, however described, constitutes an offence and is punishable with death, life imprisonment or a term for two years under the laws of Guyana.”
Nandlall pointed out that the defence is creating the impression that there has to be an offence committed locally that is equivalent to the extradited offence, which he argued is not the case.
“The offence don’t have to be equivalent. The conduct, the act or omission, has to constitute an offence in Guyana. There no equivalence of offences… The two persons are charged with money laundering offences and conduct there in America that they are accused of… explicitly sets out what the particulars are. You have to examine those particulars and see whether those particulars, those facts, the actions that they are accused of, whether it constitutes an offence in Guyana. It doesn’t necessarily have to be money laundering in Guyana, but it is money laundering in Guyana.

It is the similarity of the conduct “however described”, the AG emphasised.
The Mohameds are facing an 11-count indictment in the Southern District of Florida for wire fraud, mail fraud and money laundering in connection with alleged financial crimes involving gold exports.
The businessmen had moved to the High Court to block the extradition proceedings, but this application was rejected by Chief Justice Navindra Singh on Monday.
As a result, the extradition hearing proceeded on Tuesday at the Georgetown Magistrates’ Court with Principal Magistrate Judy Latchman ruling that the matter could not be paused in the absence of a formal stay from a superior court.
This was after the defence team argued that proceeding with the committal process while appeals and judicial review proceedings remain pending would expose the Mohameds to serious prejudice.
Delay tactics & deliberate misleading
However, Nandlall lamented the persistent delay tactics and deliberate misleading being deployed to stall the extradition.
“I don’t think these guys ever did an extradition case in their life. And they go and lament. It doesn’t concern me whether they know the law or not. What concerns me is their contamination of the public domain with unrivalled ignorance; that is my concern. Misleading the public and bringing the administration of justice into disrepute…”
“Nobody’s stopping them from challenging. But the law has rules regarding its processes. And when those rules are violated and multiple proceedings are filed in relation to the same issues, the law says that after a while it amounts to an abuse of the court’s process. And the court has a duty to guard itself against such conduct,” the AG maintained.
In their court document, the Mohameds, through their lawyers, are arguing that the extradition cannot proceed because it amounts to political persecution, given that Azruddin, the head of the We Invest in Nationhood (WIN) party, is a political rival of the governing People’s Progressive Party/Civic (PPP/C).
Nandlall pointed out that the father-and-son duo entered the political arena already aware that a US extradition request was imminent. In fact, the AG reasoned that if such an argument were to hold, it would open the door for any individual to avoid extradition by entering politics.
“That would be a strange state of affairs if that is a law in any country,” he emphasised.
According to the Attorney General, “They entered the political arena knowing full well that an extradition request was coming, and now they’re claiming that the Government of Guyana cannot extradite them because they are political rivals. If that is the law, it means that any person who is likely to be the subject of likely extradition, all they have to do to avoid extradition is to enter into the political realm, become an opponent of the Government. Then the Government of the day, they can be accused of bias and therefore become incapable or disqualified from extraditing.”
After being sanctioned by the US Department of the Treasury Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) for involvement in significant public corruption in June 2024, in June 2025 Azruddin launched his bid as a presidential candidate for the September 2025 General and Regional Elections (GRE). The WIN party went on to win 16 seats in the National Assembly.
“The OFAC sanctions came when the Mohameds were not in politics. The Mohameds entered politics after the sanctions were imposed, and by the time they entered politics, it was already in the public domain that the Americans were likely to extradite them. They enter the political field knowing that in the heat of the political campaign both sides were criticising each other,” Nandlall noted.
Subsequently, on October 30, 2025, the US Government formally submitted an extradition request to the Government of Guyana for the Mohameds. The Mohameds are currently in court fighting the extradition request.
The extradition hearing will continue today in the Magistrates’ Court.