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The Shevchenkivskyi District Court of Kyiv city continued the consideration of the proceedings on the arrest of the shares of JSC Motor Sich. This time, the court considered motions to lift four arrests from the shares the company from two shareholder companies at once.
It was announced by Aleksandr Maksimenko, the lawyer, commenting on the results of the court session on October 21.
‘We continue a series of appeals against the arrests imposed by the Shevchenkivskyi District Court within the criminal proceedings of the pre-trial investigation carried out by the Security Service of Ukraine. We did not get the desired result in previous court hearings (the lift of the arrests, ed.). Therefore, according to the current legislation, we will try to lift the arrest again’ said Mr Maksimenko, the lawyer, in comments to journalists.
This time, one of the shareholders initiates the lift of four arrests from the shares of the company at once. The arrests were imposed within the same criminal case.
Court hearings on the motions of two shareholders were scheduled on the same day with an interval of five minutes. Vitaliy Tsiktich, who was previously kept in mind for his participation in the case of ‘ex-Berkuts’, was appointed the investigating judge.
Because there is one judge in these petitions, lawyers do not exclude that in case of a negative verdict on one of them, the same verdict may be expected on the second.
‘However, arrests do not only harm the business activities of company but are simply meaningless from a legal point of view as the shares in uncertificated form exist in the form of electronic records. Generally, they cannot be material evidence in a case since they cannot even physically contain traces of a crime. Uncertificated shares in the form of electronic records cannot be a tool for the destruction of equipment of JSC Motor Sich, as investigators of the Security Service of Ukraine considered. That is why today the investor companies of JSC Motor Sich repeatedly applied to the court with a motion to lift the arrests from shares,’ the lawyers noted.
Due to the failure of the investigator and the prosecutor to appear in court, the judge postponed the sessions to November 4 and 10. The lawyers are convinced it is an apparent ignorance of the court session by law enforcement officers to deliberately delay it.
Let us recall that the criminal case, which became the basis for the long-term blocking of shares and obstruction of the change of shareholders of JSC Motor Sich, was initiated by the Security Service of Ukraine in 2017.
The last of the four arrests of shares in August 2020 was initiated by the Office of the Prosecutor General of Ukraine. It happened immediately after Skyrison Aircraft Holdings, together with its partner, the DCH group of Ukrainian businessman Aleksandr Yaroslavskyi, submitted a new application to the Antimonopoly Committee of Ukraine to agree on the concentration of shares.
In the opinion of state and law enforcement agencies, the presence of Chinese investors among the shareholders of JSC Motor Sis poses a threat to the economic security of Ukraine.
At the same time, according to Pavel Rozenko, a former Vice Prime Minister, statements by the head of Ukrspetsexport Vadim Nozdrya on the priority of military and technical cooperation with private companies in Turkey in the field of aircraft engine building in the context of violation of the rights of private Chinese investors of PJSC Motor Sich is an example of double standards and an indicator of Ukraine’s unreliability as a partner in international relations.
Earlier, in an interview with RBC-Ukraine, Chinese businessman Wang Jing, who is a key shareholder of Beijing Xinwei Technology Group and Beijing Skyrizon (the investor companies of PJSC Motor Sich), explained the reason for his companies’ interest in Motor Sich.
According to the lawyers of the shareholder company, arrests and bans on shares worsen the financial position of OJSC Motor Sich as the company’s profits decreased in several times, the depressing financial condition of the company and its uncertain future caused about 8 000 employees to leave the company.
In turn, on September 4, Chinese investors from Skyrizon sent a notification to the Ukrainian government on their intention to start international arbitration against Ukraine, demanding compensation for $3.5 billion in damages.
As the businessman and owner of the DCH group of companies Aleksandr Yaroslavskyi said earlier, the authorities must stop preventing the legitimate shareholders of Motor Sich from disposing of their property.
