Court of Appeal confirms seizure of shares in Kyivstar, IDS Ukraine and related companies
The Kyiv Court of Appeal confirmed the seizure of 47.855345% of the shares of the largest Ukrainian telecom operator Kyivstar and 100% of the largest player in the mineral water market IDS Ukraine, imposed in October last year as part of a criminal case against Mikhail Fridman, as indicated in the court ruling dated December 18, made public on January 1.
According to information in the state register of court decisions, the court consolidated appeals of VEON Ltd. VEON Holdings B.V., Kyivstar.Tech LLC and Ukraine Tower Company, as well as New World Value Fund Limited, which owns 34.83% of IDS Ukraine, and a number of other persons.
“The materials of the proceedings indicate that at this stage of criminal proceedings, the needs of the pre-trial investigation justify such interference in the rights and interests of these property owners for the purposes defined in Paragraph 1 of Part 2 of Article 170 of the Criminal Procedure Code of Ukraine, that is, in order to ensure the preservation of material evidence in criminal proceedings,” the panel of judges justified.
In turn, VEON noted that it is not part of any consortium and does not have a contractual relationship with the Alfa Group consortium, controlled by Fridman, and Fridman himself and other sanctioned entities do not have the status of final beneficiaries of VEON.
The company also indicated that the seizure of Kyivstar's corporate rights would lead to a stop or excessive restriction of lawful business activities, which are of critical importance in the context of martial law in Ukraine.
In turn, the appellants regarding the seizure of shares of the companies of the IDS Ukraine group noted that in the event of confiscation of Fridman’s assets, the matter will concern mot only 18.23% of the share of corporate rights, and the share of the remaining sanctioned representatives of Alfa Group, who are not involved in this criminal case, is 31.76%.
New World Value Fund Limited emphasized that its beneficiaries are British citizens who are in no way connected with Alfa Group.
As reported, the Shevchenkivsky District Court of Kyiv on October 13 reduced the package of seized shares of PrJSC Kyivstar from 99.994654% to 47.85%, and the arrested share of Lifecell LLC - from 100% to 19.8% as part of security measures at the open case against co-owner of Alfa Group Fridman at the end of September. It made such changes to the earlier ruling dated October 4 on the basis of a petition from the prosecutor of the Prosecutor General's Office due to a clerical error.
Regarding the remaining seized assets, the Shevchenkivsky court confirmed the correctness of their initial description. In particular, the corporate rights of four companies affiliated with Kyivstar remain under arrest, in particular Kyivstar.Tech (100%), Helsi (69.99%), Ukraine Tower Company (100%) and VimpelCom Global Services Ukraine (100%).
The list of seized shares also includes 100% of Lifecell-related LLC Paycell and Ukrtower and assets in the financial sector of 100% of Alfa Insurance, Alfa Leasing Ukraine, Parity Finpans, Sense Digital, Universal leasing company Alfa.