Mikhail Fridman, chairman and CEO of Alfa Group holding, reads the Kommersant newspaper in his office.
Photo: Dmitry Dukhanin
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Alfa Bank Top Notch at Execution
On Jan. 20, Moskovskaya Pravda was served with a judgment on initiating execution under the writ of execution of Moscow Arbitration which upheld the claims of Alfa Bank and Alfa Group CEO Mikhail Fridman against Moskovskaya Pravda newspaper. Now the newspaper has three days to publish a denial to its article “Pero i Pulya” (Russian for the Pen & the Bullet) of July 21, 2004 and five days to indemnify the bank and personally Mr Fridman for the goodwill damage resulted from the article. The newspaper was actually deprived of any chances to appeal to the Federal Arbitration of the Moscow District to hold up execution. The Court of Appeal had failed to send required documents in due time, similar to the case with Kommersant where the bailiffs are expected today.
On October 6, 2004, Moscow Arbitration ruled that the information published by Moskovskaya Pravda in the article “Pero i Pula” “does not correspond to reality and discredits goodwill of Alfa Bank and Mikhail Fridman” and obliged it to pay 2m rbl to Mikhail Fridman and 3m rbl to Alfa Bank. Simultaneously, Moskovskaya Pravda has been forced to deny the data contained in the article. Focused on one of the versions of Paul Khlebnikov’s murder, the article said that allegedly he had been killed in the aftermath of the publication related to Alfa Group. The newspaper appealed on November 5, 2004 but the 9th Arbitration Court of Appeal overruled the motion on December 10, 2004, having sustained the award of Moscow Arbitration.
Moskovskaya Pravda published the article two weeks after Kommersant’s “Bank Crisis Came Out on the Streets” against which Alfa Bank filed a suit for more than $11m. Still, all courts were a week or two ahead with Moskovskaya Pravda’s case, as if polishing up the methods “to approach real money”. Anyway, the writ of execution against Kommersant has been issued to-date.
According to Georgy Ivanov, head of Kommersant’s legal service, the case had been in the Court of Appeal even the day before yesterday, though the law sets forth 3 days for such action. Kommersant couldn’t even see a protocol – the proceedings’ record has not been stitched.
“We saw the record only yesterday – well stitched already.” Moreover, the plaintiff received the writ of execution a week ago as the cover bears a signature of an Alfa representative, certifying that he went through the case before the defendant. So, similar to Moskovskaya Pravda, they may see our motion at the Court of Cassation already on expiration of the term for voluntary execution of the award, Georgy Ivanov said.
In answer to Kommersant’s question how the plaintiff could have achieved such success in jurisdiction, Alfa Bank’s briefer Stanislav Ismagilov requested to submit such question in writing and promised to forward it to the bank’s legal service. “We will see what we can do for you,” said Mr Ismagilov. No response from the legal service has followed.
www.kommersant.com
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