‘The State Retirement Fund undergoes various inspections on a regular basis, including those carried out by the prosecution authorities. The fund makes the pension payments either through a bank or by post, depending on each particular retiree’s preferences. All of the fund’s intermediaries are for-profit organizations. So, first, the money was transferred to the Russian Post; then, the post placed the money with Bank VEFK-Ural,’ the Russian Federation Retirement Fund’s Sverdlovsk Region division CEO Sergey Dubinkin said in the course of a recent press conference in Yekaterinburg.

In the meantime, the fund’s local division has been undergoing the regional public prosecution authorities’ checks for about three months now.

‘Bank VEFK-Ural appears to have ‘withheld’ about 1 billion RUR, but nearly a half of the sum has already been paid to the pensioners, so the latter haven’t felt the delay yet and are not going to feel it in the future. The pensions will be paid on time,’ he promised.

‘Nevertheless, the authorities will probably take legal action,’ Dubinkin noted.

As a matter of fact, the Yekaterinburg-based East European Financial Corporation-Ural Bank’s (Bank VEFK-Ural) license was revoked on February 19, 2009 because of the bank’s inability to meet its financial obligations.