On May 17, 2006, Sverdlovsk Regional Court of Arbitration adjudicated the claim laid by Koltsovo Airport JSC against Ural Airlines JSC. The airport demanded that Ural Airlines and the plaintiff sign the contract of handing over some socially important establishments to Yekaterinburg municipality and bear expenses of the handover on a pro rata basis.

The plaintiff’s claim is based on the total privatization plan designed in 1993 during the privatization of the state enterprise Sverdlovsk Airline and its further disintegration into Koltsovo Airport JSC and Ural Airlines JSC.

As a result, the liabilities of Sverdlovsk Airline to maintain socially important establishments were taken on by Koltsovo Airport on condition that Ural Airlines bear 50% of the relevant costs. Thus, both companies were to maintain the dormitory, the housing facilities, children’s clubs, the kindergarten, and a summer camp, preparing to hand them over to Yekaterinburg municipality.

‘For eight years, the two companies had been running everything together, but then they gradually started passing the property rights as well as the corresponding liabilities to Yekaterinburg municipality. At the moment, a few obsolete houses and the dormitory still haven’t been handed over; they need to be renovated first, and these are the expenses Koltsovo Airport wants the defendant to bear on the afore-mentioned pro rata basis and considering the total privatization plan,’ said Ms Fedotova, the spokesperson for Koltsovo Airport.

Ms Fedotova says that Ural Airlines refuse to sign any contract of such sort and bear expenses: their explanation is that a similar contract had been signed at some point but later dissolved.

‘The court rejected the plaintiff’s claim as signing a contract can only be a voluntary act not subject to legal coercion, yet the expenses implied by the renovation process are rather substantial, so the airport will keep negotiating with the airline in order to reach a civilized and legal consensus,’ Mr Fedotova said.