Metrojet operator Kogalymavia declared bankrupt
MOSCOW. Feb 13 (Interfax) - Arbitration court in Moscow has declared bankrupt Kogalymavia Airlines LLC, which operated under the Metrojet brand, an Interfax correspondent reported from the court.
Kogalymavia stopped flying in December 2015, shortly after one of its planes crashed in Egypt's Sinai Peninsula on October 31, 2015, killing all 224 people on board.
"Declare Kogalymavia Airlines bankrupt and begin a six-month term of receivership in relation to it," the court ordered.
The court scheduled the report of the insolvency administrator to be heard on August 7, 2018.
Supervision procedures were imposed on Kogalymavia in April 2017, when the court validated claims filed by Moscow's Federal Tax Service Inspectorate N23 over the company's bankruptcy. As a result, the tax body's claims for 155.8 million rubles were included in the Kogalymavia's register of creditors. In addition, the court appointed Rimma Bagaviyeva temporary administrator.
Aside from the Federal Tax Service, Kogalymavia's register of creditors includes Credit Europe Bank (736.6 million rubles) and TT-Travel LLC (774.1 million rubles).
The bankruptcy hearing had been postponed a number of times as Kogalymavia endeavored to reach an out-of-court settlement. The airline expected to cope with the financial difficulties arising from the plane crash in Sinai, which the Russian authorities concluded was the result of a terrorist bomb that was planted on board.
Kogalymavia, founded in 1993, specialized in flights serving the oil industry. The airline focused on charter flights in 2011, rebranding itself as Metrojet in 2012. The airline is owned by three individuals via Zapadnaya Aviatsionno-Investitsionnaya Kompaniya LLC: Turkish tourism magnate Hamit Cankut Bagana, Amirbek Gagayev and Buvaysar Khalidov, according to the SPARK-Interfax analytical system.