Appeal filed against court order to extend Yevtushenkov house arrest
MOSCOW. Nov 17 (Interfax) - The defense team of the AFK Sistema chief Vladimir Yevtushenkov has appealed against a decision to extend his house arrest until March 16 as part of an inquiry into Bashneft.
"Today we filed an appellate complaint against the court ruling to extend the house arrest for Vladimir Yevtushenkov," his lawyer Alexander Gofshtein told Interfax on Monday.
By law, the complaint will be submitted, along with the case files, to the Moscow City Court, an appellate court.
It was reported that last Friday Moscow's Basmanny Court judge Valentina Levashova granted the investigators' request to extend the house arrest of the Sistema chief until March 16, i.e. for another period of up to six months.
Russian Investigative Committee (RIC) spokesman Vladimir Markin said earlier that Yevtushenkov had been charged with money laundering. Later it emerged that a new version of the charges had been filed, whereby he is not simply charged with the legalization of assets but of being the mastermind behind the Bashneft sale scheme. The period of the criminal inquiry has been extended until April 28, 2015.
It was reported that the Basmanny Court ordered the seizure of Sistema's shares in Bashneft as part of the criminal inquiry. On October 27 the Arbitration Court ruled in favor of the Russian Prosecutor General's Office's lawsuit against Sistema and compelled the corporation to return these assets to the state.
The privatization of Bashkortostan's oil companies and their subsequent sale to Sistema are the subject of several criminal inquiries and lawsuits. Apart from Yevtushenkov, charges have also been filed against former Bashneft chief Ural Rakhimov and businessman Levon Airapetyan. Rakhimov is on the international wanted list; Airapetyan was arrested in July.
Sistema bought the Bashkir oil assets from funds which were thought to be closely linked to the then leader of the Republic of Bashkortostan, Murtaza Rakhimov, and his son Ural.