The Moscow Oil Refinery is once again involved in a scandal.
Photo: Dmitry Lebedev
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Moscow Refinery Showered with Suits
Moscow’s 9th Court of Appeals turned down a suit of the Moscow Oil Refinery’s major shareholders yesterday to charge U.S.-based Joy Lud International Distributors with $309 for the fuel it allegedly had not paid for. The American company and its owner Timur Sapir proved that they had paid extra $27 million for the oil. They are now considering a counter-claim against the Moscow Refinery. The sum of Timur Sapir’s present and upcoming suits against the refinery totals $315 million.
The Court of Appeals upheld the ruling of the Court of Arbitration as of June 26 that had declined to satisfy the claim of Sibneft, Moscow Oil and Gas Company, Central Fuel Company and the Fenix company to invalidate the deal on fuel supplies between the Moscow Oil Refinery and Joy Lud International Distributors (JLID). The claimants maintain that the deal is invalid as it had been executed by the refinery’s director also who had not asked shareholders. The latter now demand that Joy Lud return $176.9 million, the price for the fuel supplied, and $132 million in fees.
Larisa Ryabchenko, the lawyer for Joy Lud, said that the deal had already been ruled valid at three instances of arbitrations. “Bank of Moscow presented at the hearings files proving that JLDI had not only paid for the supplies but even overpaid some $27 million,” she says. The American company is now considering filing a counter-claim.
The Arbitration Court of Moscow is also currently examining the suit to execute the decision of the Stockholm Court which ruled this summer to levy from the Moscow Refinery some $28 million for losses and fees for benefit of JLDI since the Moscow plant had not fulfilled the terms of the contract.
An unfinished polypropylene plant became a reason for Timur Sapir’s another suit. Fiber Technologies International, which is affiliated with Sapir’s company, signed a contract with the Moscow Refinery to design and construct the complex. JLID was going to finance the construction by the funds acquired from oil sales. Thus, the break of the contract stopped the construction. FTI wants to recover $240 million. The hearings are to start in March in London.
www.kommersant.com
All the Article in Russian as of Nov. 23, 2005
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