Prosecutor General's Office seeks extradition from U.S. of FESRC ex-head Borbot accused of 4 bln ruble fraud - newspaper
VLADIVOSTOK. May 12 (Interfax) - The Russian Prosecutor General's Office is trying to secure the deportation from the United States of former director of the Far Eastern Shipbuilding and Ship Repair Center (FESRC) Igor Borbot, who has been charged in absentia by the Russian Investigative Committee with large-scale misappropriation during the construction of the Zvezda shipyard in the town of Bolshoi Kamen, the Kommersant newspaper reported on Thursday.
"Hoping that Borbot will be returned to the Russian Federation, the Prosecutor General's Office and the Russian Investigative Committee prepared the relevant documents, translated them and forwarded them to the U.S. But their consideration is taking too long. In any case, the person charged in absentia is still overseas," the newspaper said.
According to the newspaper, Borbot had problems with U.S. immigration authorities due to an expired visa, and when it transpired that he is on Interpol's international wanted list, representatives of the U.S. Department of Justice asked Russia to tell them exactly what accusations he faces and what penalties such a crime entails.
Kommersant also recalls that the U.S. and Russia do not have an extradition agreement. However, the Russian-U.S. working group for tackling legal problems, established at the initiative of Russian Prosecutor General Yury Chaika, managed to agree that wanted persons may be deported to Russia if their presence in the U.S. is ruled illegal.
The Russian Consulate General in New York told Interfax on Wednesday that the U.S. authorities had notified Russian diplomats of the detention of Russian citizen Borbot, former head of the Far Eastern Shipbuilding and Ship Repair Center, on accusations of violating U.S. migration laws.
Interpol reported that Borbot was on the wanted list on large-scale fraud accusations.
In April 2015, the Russian deputy prime minister and the president's envoy to the Far Eastern Federal District, Yury Trutnev, told a joint session of the boards of the Russian Prosecutor General's Office and the Far East Development Ministry in Khabarovsk that investigative agencies were looking into a number of criminal cases opened into the misappropriation of more than four billion rubles during the construction of the Zvezda shipyard in Primorye.
"The former head of OJSC Far Eastern Shipbuilding and Ship Repair Center, Igor Borbot, and a number of his accomplices are hiding abroad and have been declared internationally wanted," Trutnev said then.
OJSC Zvezda Far Eastern Plant, located in the town of Bolshoi Kamen, Primorye territory, is a leading shipbuilding center in Russia's east, specializing in repairing, reequipping and upgrading nuclear submarines. A project to set up a center to build civilian vessels and oil platforms is currently being implemented on the basis of this plant.
