Court Cancels Telenor Fine

FORNEBU, Norway, and OMSK, Russia -- The Eighth Arbitrazh Appellate Court in Omsk in Siberia has today cancelled the USD 2.8 billion judgment issued against Telenor last August in Khanty-Mansiysk. The Omsk court said it will reconsider the case from the beginning on 19 February at 10 am.

"We are pleased the Omsk court has cancelled the deeply flawed decision of the Khanty-Mansiysk court, although we would have liked to see this case end," said Jan Edvard Thygesen, Executive Vice President and head of Telenor's Central and Eastern European operations. "We trust that when the Omsk court reconsiders the case in February it will dismiss Farimex's claim."

The original case was filed by little-known British Virgin Islands-based Farimex Products, Inc., which claimed that VimpelCom suffered financial harm allegedly caused by Telenor due to delays in VimpelCom's acquisition of loss-making Ukrainian mobile operation, Ukrainian Radio Systems (URS). Farimex is a BVI shell company, which claims to hold a 0.002 per cent stake in VimpelCom and whose sole director is Dmitry Fridman.

"We are keen to see the court's written decision and to learn the reasons the court cancelled the decision of the Khanty-Mansiysk court," said Thygesen. "In our view, by pursuing this action, those behind Farimex are undermining the efforts of the Russian state to advance the rule of law and improve the investment climate in Russia."

Telenor Group (Nasdaq: TELN)