UKRAINE-VLASENKO-FIRTASH

Kharkiv, August 13 (Interfax-Ukraine) – The consideration of a lawsuit lodged by former Ukrainian Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko in a U.S. court against a co-owner of gas trader RosUkrEnergo, Dmytro Firtash, is proceeding “rather hard” due to problems related to the handing of a summons to the defendant, the ex-premier’s defense lawyer, Serhiy Vlasenko, has said.

“The main problem concerns the handing of a summons to Mr. Firtash, who always yells that he is ready to sue anyone, but at the same time he is hiding, not sending his lawyers and giving no opportunity to hand a summons to them,” he told Interfax-Ukraine on Friday.

As reported, Tymoshenko said earlier that a U.S. court had taken up her lawsuit against Firtash. She said that in her lawsuit she is asking the court to recognize the actions of Firtash and Ukraine’s senior officials to return 12 billion cubic meters of gas to RosUkrEnergo as illegal, and to recognize that the amicable agreement that was reached at the Stockholm court was a conspiracy.

Firtash, in turn, said expressed doubt that “Ms. Tymoshenko has any grounds to challenge this decision in New York’s courts or any other judicial bodies.”

It was reported earlier that the Arbitration Institute of the Stockholm Chamber of Commerce obliged Naftogaz on June 8, 2010 to return RosUkrEnergo 11 billion cubic meters of gas and also pay it a penalty of 1.1 billion cubic meters of gas, as stipulated by the contract. Naftogaz, in turn, returned 12.1 billion cubic meters of gas to RosUkrEnergo after buying the necessary amount from Russia’s Gazprom at $230 per 1,000 cubic meters.

[UA EUROPE EEU EMRG NGS]

PA

12:17:46 EET-2