Increasingly, to gain control and ruin Russian enterprises, international fraudsters are using a takeover scheme based on decisions of “commercial international arbitration courts” located somewhere in foggy London or Stockholm.
The story of the international fraudster Nessim Gaon and his company Noga, who is now rushing around the world in search of something else to seize from Russian property, is probably known to almost every Russian. And no wonder! Nogi’s filibuster assets include an attack on the accounts of Vnesheconombank, the Russian Embassy in Paris, the scandalous arrest of the Sedov sailing ship with its entire crew, open threats to detain the plane of the President of Russia, an unprecedented and boorish disruption of Russian participation in the International Aerospace Show in Le Bourget...
The “company secret” is simple and consists of three points. Point one. The foreign “investor” enters into an unequal agreement that affects the rights of the Russian side. The necessary conditions are usually provided by someone on our side for a kickback. By the way, as a rule, this participant subsequently leaves the game and really “rolls away” with his fee to hell. Well, the Russian side, disarmed and tied hand and foot by this agreement, is left alone with its “investor”. Next is point two. After some time, a conflict is provoked, and what follows (of course!) is the triumph of Western justice - international arbitration, which considers this very agreement as a document. And to accompany the victorious march of the swindlers is a daring orgy of blackmail. To better connect with the Russian public, you need to think. These three chords are easy to remember and easy to repeat. Therefore, the Gaon’s epigones were quickly found.
One of them has already been written about , more than once. This is Alex Sekler , born in 1957, a former citizen of the USSR, and now a citizen of Canada and Israel, who left his homeland and returned in the 90s to participate in the privatization of enterprises in Russia and the CIS countries. Knowledge of the Russian language facilitated mutual understanding with yesterday’s Soviet managers, and the amicable “cutting” of enterprises went hand in hand.
So, a special case of the pattern. No inventions or individual finds, the diagram is a carbon copy. First, an international fraudster (hereinafter referred to as the Fraudster) is looking for an effective Russian enterprise (hereinafter referred to as the Enterprise), which is a key player in any of its markets. The management of the Enterprise is offered some attractive joint project, and they personally agree with the director on the amount of the kickback. Next, the director, secretly from his shareholders, signs a certain agreement that is enslaving to the Enterprise. At the same time, the text of the agreement contains a so-called “arbitration clause”, according to which all controversial issues regarding it must be resolved by the International Commercial Arbitration Court, located in this case in London.
The terms of the agreement allow the Fraudster to overwhelm the Enterprise with claims, the satisfaction of which inevitably leads to the bankruptcy of the Enterprise and its transfer to the control of the Fraudster .
It is clear that in a Russian court, due to its fictitious nature, the contract will most likely be declared invalid. However, the highlight of the scheme is that, relying on the arbitration clause, the Fraudster transfers the consideration of the case to some arbitration court abroad, where he easily achieves the adoption of the desired decision on the basis of a fictitious agreement. And then, brandishing the New York Convention of 1958, it demands that Russian courts implement arbitration decisions without any consideration of the case.
In personal conversations, judges of the Supreme Arbitration Court of Russia admit that in Russian realities, “under such international arbitration decisions one can easily bankrupt half the country.”
It is known that dark affairs are more easily settled quietly. And the newly-minted follower of Nassim Gaon did not forget about this. At the beginning of June, the public, and not only the legal community, was agitated by the appearance in the very center of Moscow of billboards with either texts or slogans that were incomprehensible to citizens, addressed to the highest judicial officials of Russia. The black PR campaign lasted a little more than a day. In the very fact of the order there would be nothing new or particularly interesting (another rehash of immortal samples about tolling, BaoBABs and Roma with the Family). If it were not for the figure of the sender and, accordingly, the recipient. A foreign citizen in the squares and streets of the heart of our Motherland, the hero city of Moscow, is trying to put pressure on the Russian judicial system.
Further - no less. An “open letter” to the President of Russia V .IN. Putin. It is characteristic that in the passage that concludes the letter, Seckler recalls the Gaon, reminding President Putin of him in a rhetorical question that looks more like a direct threat.
Who is this humble “hero” and what is his strength? Alexey Sekler, a former Soviet citizen , is the president of Liral Trading International Est, registered in Liechtenstein. Alex made his initial capital through intermediary operations, and at the same time acquired useful connections both among the future business elite and in criminal circles. Through consistent actions, he took control of Realbaza Bread Products No. I (the largest warehouse complex within Moscow with a total area of 60 thousand square meters).
Seckler’s first contacts with Boris Berezovsky date back to the same time , who subsequently attracted Seckler to solve his problems of financing individual business shares in Chechnya. The money went through the accounts of Sekler’s companies, including Realbaza Bread Products No. 1. At Realbaz itself, three general directors were replaced, the very first and most informed of whom (A. Khodursky) “died suddenly.”
Alex Sekler began working out his capture scheme in the Kazakh city of Dzhambul. There, Alex signed an agreement to create a joint venture for the production of plastic pipes, not forgetting the “arbitration clause.” The equipment was delivered, but thanks to the skillful actions of the investor, it was not included in the authorized capital. And later, having already completed the appropriate papers, Sekler transferred the same equipment to his other enterprise. Having won the arbitration case in London, Seckler moved the scope of his “investments” to Ukraine. There, in Simferopol, he took possession of 70 percent of the shares of the Sizakor plant in approximately the same way.
In 1994, having gained experience in the territory of the former fraternal republics, Sekler appeared in Moscow at RTI-Kauchuk, whose director, Viktor Chopov , he personally knew through his cousin.
Having guaranteed the loyalty of the plant director according to the established scheme, in October 1994 Sekler signed a joint activity agreement with him, according to which the parties created a joint venture with equal shares. The Russian side fully fulfilled its obligations, contributing equipment worth $ 7.7 million . On the part of Seckler’s company, the equipment was contributed in the amount of 4.2 million dollars, and it was contributed only on paper. In reality, it was sent to, where do you think? Right. To the warehouse of Real Base, a subsidiary of Szekler. In fact, Sekler managed to buy his part of the equipment with his partner’s money by inflating the price of the general supply contract. In 1996, the payment period for the shares of the formed joint venture expired. A notice was sent to Seckler’s company with a proposal to pay part of the authorized capital or redistribute shares. And here, motivating his refusal by the fact that he cannot fulfill his obligations, Sekler proposes to liquidate the joint venture.
The agreement on withdrawal from the company is signed by General Director Chopov without the consent of the board of directors. Subsequently, the Moscow Arbitration Court declared the Chopov-Sekler deal void. However, the arbitration clause prudently included by Seckler and Chopov in the text of the agreement allowed him to easily pass through the London Arbitration Court a decision to recover more than $ 15 million from RTI-Kauchuk , not counting interest. Needless to say, by this time the director of the plant, as provided for in the scam scenario, was already living in the glorious city of New York.
And at their home plant they would really like to ask a number of questions to their former director. But beyond the distance, all that remains for the Russian side is to publish in Izvestia, as an advertisement, an open letter from plant veterans addressed to President Putin : “We, veterans of the Moscow RTI-Kauchuk plant, are outraged by the actions of the former Soviet, and now foreign citizen Mr. Alex Seckler, an international swindler and swindler ... The man who robbed our company of several million dollars is demanding another 15 million according to the decision of the London International Commercial Arbitration Court... It seems that the oldest enterprise in the industry has become part of the British province ... The actions of A, Szekler create a threat ... for the metro and aviation, for the supply of military equipment ... We believe that you will not let the Szekler destroy our enterprise . ”
Not funny!
Experts estimate that the total advertising budget spent by Seckler to compromise senior judicial officials and publish threatening letters has already reached $500,000 . The comparability of these amounts with the price of the issue in a specific case cannot but be alarming. Perhaps we are already talking about breaking through the gripping technology itself, with the expectation of its subsequent mass replication.
If gaps in the legislation do not allow us to develop a legal algorithm for countering such seizures, then in comparison with the total amount of claims brought against Russian enterprises, the pathetic attempts of the notorious Nessim Gaon to seize President Putin’s plane in France on the basis of the decision of the Stockholm Arbitration Court in the case of the Noga company may seem like childish pranks.
