Nigeria Court Rules Binance Executive Can Face Trial on Behalf of Crypto Exchange

Nigeria Court Rules Binance Executive Can Face Trial on Behalf of Crypto Exchange
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Nigeria Court Rules Binance Executive Can Face Trial on Behalf of Crypto Exchange

Nigeria Court Rules Binance Executive Can Face Trial on Behalf of Crypto Exchange

A Nigerian court on Friday ruled that Binance executive Tigran Gambaryan can stand trial on behalf of the cryptocurrency exchange in an ongoing tax evasion case.

Binance and executives Gambaryan, a US citizen and head of financial crimes compliance, and British-Kenyan national Nadeem Anjarwalla, a regional manager for Africa, face four counts of tax evasion.

In a separate case, they have also been charged with laundering more than $35 million and engaging in specialised financial activities without a licence. They have all pleaded not guilty to the money laundering charges.

Binance's lawyer declined to comment after Friday's court hearing. Gambaryan's lawyer also had no comment, Reuters reported.

Gambaryan remains in custody while Anjarwalla fled the country in March. Nigeria's security adviser's office has said it is working with Interpol to seek Anjarwalla's arrest.

The CEO of Binance has accused Nigeria of setting a dangerous precedent after its executives were invited to the African country in February for talks with authorities and then detained as part of a crackdown on crypto.

Binance itself has not been charged in the tax evasion case by Nigeria's Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS), which has said Gambaryan could face the charges on the exchange's behalf.

Gambaryan's lawyer has previously said Gambaryan was "neither a director, partner nor company secretary" and had no written instructions from Binance to face the charges on its behalf.

Judge Emeka Nwite ruled on Friday that Gambaryan should be served with the charges against Binance because he is the chief financial compliance officer of Binance and he was duly appointed to represent it in a meeting in Nigeria.

Gambaryan will be arraigned in court on Wednesday to take a plea on behalf of Binance.

Gambaryan's bail application in relation to the money laundering case was denied on Friday.

Nigeria has blamed Binance for its currency woes after cryptocurrency websites emerged as platforms of choice for trading the Nigerian naira currency, as the country grappled with chronic dollar shortages.



SDAIA, KAUST Launch MiniGPT-Med Model to Help Doctors Diagnose Medical Radiology through AI

SDAIA, KAUST Launch MiniGPT-Med Model to Help Doctors Diagnose Medical Radiology through AI
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SDAIA, KAUST Launch MiniGPT-Med Model to Help Doctors Diagnose Medical Radiology through AI

SDAIA, KAUST Launch MiniGPT-Med Model to Help Doctors Diagnose Medical Radiology through AI

The Center of Excellence for Data Science and Artificial Intelligence at the Saudi Data and Artificial Intelligence Authority (SDAIA) and King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST) have introduced the MiniGPT-Med model.

The large multi-modal language model is designed to help doctors quickly and accurately diagnose medical radiology using artificial intelligence techniques.

Dr. Ahmed Alsinan, the Artificial Intelligence Advisor at the National Center for Artificial Intelligence and head of the scientific team at SDAIA, explained that the MiniGPT-Med model is capable of performing various tasks such as generating medical reports, answering medical visual questions, describing diseases, locating diseases, identifying diseases, and documenting medical descriptions based on entered medical images.

The model was trained on different medical images, including X-rays, CT scans, and MRIs.

The MiniGPT-Med model, derived from large-scale language models, is specifically tailored for medical applications and demonstrates significant versatility across different imaging methods, including X-rays, CT scans, and MRI. This enhances its utility in medical diagnosis.

Dr. Alsinan highlighted that the MiniGPT-Med model was developed collaboratively by artificial intelligence specialists from SDAIA and KAUST.

The model exhibits advanced performance in generating medical reports, achieving 19% higher efficiency than previous models. It serves as a general interface for radiology diagnosis, enhancing diagnostic efficiency across various medical imaging applications.