The owner of TVi channel Konstantin Kagalovsky has said that the television channel has been illegally seized with the help of law-enforcement agencies.

In a statement forwarded to the Ukrainska Pravda publication on Tuesday, Kagalovsky said that the classical illegal seizure of the television channel was carried out with the help of Deputy Head for Security of the television channel, Oleh Radchenko, who earlier stole the regulations documents of TVi channel.

The statement says that according to the channel's lawyers, the regulations were not amended.

"There are no legal grounds for replacing the owner," reads the statement.

"The notorious Altman will not finance the channel, as he does not have enough resources for this. Altman is used by some other forces – it hasn't been established what forces," Kagalovsky said.

Journalist Mustafa Nayem said in Twitter than Kagalovsky said by phone that the power of attorney of his Cypriot company had been counterfeited and the channel was seized.

Earlier on Tuesday, the press service of TVi reported that Artem Shevchenko has been appointed new director general of the channel, who replaced Natalia Katerynchuk. The new investor of the channel has become a famous U.S. businessman Oleksandr Altman.

Altman said that his top priority task is to retain the channel as one of the unbiased sources of information in Ukraine.

"I've been a business-partner of Kagalovsky and [Vladimir] Gusinsky who founded the channel. I was born in Ukraine, I believe that Ukraine is my native land and I'll make everything that our country becomes a member of the European Union," Altman said.

As reported, the National Council for Television and Radio Broadcasting on April 11, 2013 make amendments to the license of TVi, according to which Kyiv-based Media Info LLC has increased its stake in Kyiv-based TeleRadioSvit television and radio broadcasting company LLC, which broadcasts satellite television programs under the TVi logo, from 43.6% to 100%.

According to the document, talk-show host Oleksiy Lichman was appointed a member of the editorial team, replacing Mykola Kniazhytsky (became an MP in 2012) and Volodymyr Pavliuk (moved to STB in 2011) and Vaclav Havel, who died at the end of 2011.

As of September 2012, the co-owners of TVi along with Media Infor were Seradgill Holdings Ltd. (49%) and International Media Company LLC (Kyiv, 7.4%). The national council said that the share of Seradgill Holdings was earlier 92.6%.

The key owner of Media Info as of September 2013 was Wilcox Ventures Ltd.

There has been a long-running conflict over TVi. There have been court actions on the matter in Ukrainian and foreign courts involving businessmen Kagalovsky and Gusinsky. The latter tried to regain control over the channel or funds invested.

However, in 2009, Kniazhytsky told Interfax-Ukraine that the channel does not belong either to Kagalovsky or Gusinsky.

"There are relations, but it cannot be said that they are owners of the channel," he said then, not disclosing the names of the end owners.

In 2012, when Media Info LLC appeared among shareholders of the TVi channel, the then director of the channel Kniazhytsky told the Telekritika publication that the introduction of Ukrainian co-owners to the structure of the shareholders is linked to the observation of the requirements of the law on the political advertisements, although the end owner of the channel is still Kagalovsky.