Higher business court declares lawful retrieving of ATEK from bankruptcy
KYIV. Dec 4 (Interfax-Ukraine) – The higher business court of Ukraine on December 1 declared lawful retrieving of private joint-stock company ATEK from bankruptcy, as its shareholders paid a debt of over UAH 22 million to the creditors on the creditors' list.
"Thus, the legal chapter in the litigation on the plant's bankruptcy lasted since August 2011 was closed," ATEK Director General Ihor Usenko said at a press conference at Interfax-Ukraine on Thursday.
Usenko said that investors are ready to invest over UAH 100 million in the development of the plant, although the plant has been blocking by armed persons for three months. He said that a group of persons leading by President of the Charitable Foundation for Educational Innovation Svitlana Zvarych is seizing the company. He said that the seizers plan to create a private logistics complex on the territory of the plant.
He said that law enforcement agencies and Ukrainian authorities ignore addresses of the plant's employees regarding the illegal seizure of the plant.
According to the leasing agreement for a part of workshop 19 of the plant signed with Charitable Foundation for Educational Innovation, machinery for the needs of the Anti-Terrorist Operation (ATO) is repaired there. The Azov training base is located there.
Representatives of the Azov regiment said at the press conference that the top managers of the company themselves transferred management of the plant to the Charitable Foundation for Educational Innovation. The foundation partially paid the plant's debt using funds sent by Ukrainians. The lawyer of the foundation said that the shareholders in the plant decided to close the bankruptcy case, not paying the whole debt: UAH 19 million out of UAH 50 million was paid.
According to the State Fiscal Service of Ukraine, the plant in August 2015 partially paid the tax debt to the national budget: as of September 1, 2015 it reached UAH 13.9 million, including UAH 12.8 million of land tax and UAH 1.2 million of VAT.
The fiscal service said that the debt appeared in 2009 and as of January 1, 2010 it was UAH 7.2 million, including UAH 6.7 million of land tax and UAH 500,000 of VAT. As of January 1, 2015, the total debt grew to UAH 28.4 million, including UAH 25.5 million of land tax and UAH 2.8 million of VAT.
ATEK plant retrieved from bankruptcy on August 20, 2015 under a court ruling.
As reported, Azov regiment said that illegal schemes are used for ATEK plant. Azov said that the State Fiscal Service department in Sviatoshynsky district of Kyiv since December 2014 has been blocking the document to restore the plant for the needs of war and officials tried to transfer the plant to its shareholders.
"Among these shareholders are Russian businessmen, who have business in so-called DPR (Donetsk People’s Republic), supporting separatists, judges of the Yanukovych regime and a blood brother of Head of the State Fiscal Service of Ukraine Roman Nasirov.
Azov regiment said it wants to emphasize that "those who pay taxes to separatists, who were killing the plant for years, looted, destroyed and forces the plant into debt, while soldiers and volunteers of Azov regiment restored production."
A shareholder in ATEK plant is KVV Group, uniting scrap metal companies. The company is headquartered in Sevastopol.