DUSHANBE, July 31, 2010, Asia-Plus -- The name of founder and owner of Innovative Road Solutions (IRS) is not a commercial secret, Fattoh Saidov, the head of the Agency for State Financial Control and Combating Corruption, told reporters in Dushanbe on July 31.

According to him, financial activity of the company may be commercial secret, while the name of its founder cannot be commercial secret.

“I will order my officers to make inquiries of the founder of IRS and we will inform you about the results after a while,” said the anticorruption agency chief, “I do not know why the name of the company founder is concealed.”

We will recall that while speaking to reporters in Dushanbe, Minister of Transport and Communications Olim Boboyev on July 27 refrained from naming the founder of IRS, the private company in charge of the toll road Dushanbe-Chanak.  He justified that by saying that “disclosure of the name of the IRS founder is punished by a large fine.” “This information is a commercial secret of foreign company,” said the minister, “Under international law, disclosure of such information is punished by the large fine.”

According to some sources, Innovative Road Solutions was registered in the British Virgin Islands.  Local experts say the company’s registration in the British Virgin Islands makes it difficult to follow its activities.  IRS is exempted from paying more than a dozen different taxes.