AFK Sistema to keep investing in Russia despite strategy revision

MOSCOW, December 8. /TASS/. The shares in the Russian oil producer Bashneft, owned by tycoon Vladimir Yevtushenkov’s AFK Sistema, return to the state on Monday.

This comes in line with the ruling of Moscow’s Arbitration Court in favor of the Prosecutor General’s Office that the privatization in the early 2000s of Bashneft, which now ranks among Russia’s top-five oil refining companies, was illegal.

The defendants were private owners of the oil company — AFK Sistema of Yevtushenkov, currently under house arrest, its investment arm Sistema-invest and Bashneft proper.

Under the court ruling, which takes effect 30 days after proclamation in early November, some 81.7% of Bashneft’s shares will pass into the ownership of the state. Another 20% of shares are in free-float.