MOSCOW, December 1 (RAPSI) – Sergei Pugachev, the former beneficiary of the International Industrial Bank (IIB or Mezhprombank) and ex-member of the Russian parliament’s upper house, appealed lower courts’ decision to recover his assets estimating $1.1 billion in the Supreme Court of Russia, RAPSI learned in the court on Tuesday.

Petition filed by Pugachev reached the court on November 30. Ex-senator asks to transfer his case, along with the cases of three former Mezhprombank top managers, for the revision by the judicial collegium on economic disputes. His appeal has not been considered yet.

The Commercial Court of Moscow in late October granted the Deposit Insurance Agency (DIA) a right to forcibly collect 75.6 billion rubles ($1.1 billion) from former Mezhprombank staff, including 68.5 billion rubles from Pugachev and Marina Illarionova, the last CEO of Mezhprombank, and 7.16 billion rubles from two former chief executives, Alexander Didenko and Alexei Zlobin.

On April 30, the Moscow Commercial Court ruled in favor of the DIA in a lawsuit filed to declare Pugachev and other Mezhprombank executives guilty of knowingly bankrupting the bank, primarily through the transfer of liquid assets. The court decided to debit 75.6 billion rubles ($1.1 bln) from former managers of the bank.

This was the largest amount ever assigned for secondary liability in Russia.The district court did not find any grounds for overturning the original verdicts of the two previous courts and ruled against Pugachev, Didenko and Zlobin’s cassational appeal. Illarionova did not appeal the sentence.

Last year, the DIA filed a lawsuit at a UK court to collect the assets which Pugachev allegedly embezzled from Mezhprombank. In July 2014, London’s High Court granted an injunction to seize $2 billion worth of Pugachev’s assets in various countries.

This September Pugachev filed a lawsuit against Russia within Permanent Court of Arbitration (PCA) in The Hague demanding $12 billion. The plaintiff said that the lawsuit is filed because of the alleged violations of obligations under bilateral investment contract with France by Russia. According to the ex - senator, from 2009, he has lost some of his assets without receiving compensation for them. Such assets include “Middle Trading Rows" on the Red Square in Moscow as well as the Yenisei Industrial Company.

Pugachev appealed the decision, but in December 2014 London’s High Court refused to release his assets.

The Moscow Commercial Court declared Mezhprombank bankrupt in November 2010 after the bank defaulted and received a 40 billion ruble ($630 million) bailout from Russia’s Central Bank. The DIA was appointed liquidator of IIB’s assets.
An investigation into the bankruptcy was launched in January 2011 on suspicion of illegal operations in the process of filing for bankruptcy and premediated bankruptcy.

Pugachev was charged with embezzlement and arrested in absentia. In November 2014, he was put on the international wanted list. In January 2015, Russia sent a request for extradition to the UK.