MOSCOW, August 1 (RAPSI) — Russia's Supreme Court has dismissed the complaints of former owners and top managers of Transaero air carrier challenging the seizure of their property worth 245 billion rubles (about $4 billion at the current exchange rate), according to the court ruling.

Under the Russian Commercial Procedure Code the claimants have the right to apply to the court of first instance with a petition to cancel the interim measures taken, arguing that there are no grounds for their further application, the Supreme Court said.

The property owned by the founder of Transaero Alexander Pleshakov, ex-chairman of the board of directors Olga Pleshakova and Tatyana Anodina (the beneficiary of Transaero and the mother of the founder of the airline) was seized in the framework of bankruptcy proceedings against Transaero.

Transaero found itself unable to pay its debts valued at 250 billion rubles in 2015. The government-approved plan of transferring 75% of company’s shares to Aeroflot failed. Its problems resulted in mass flight cancels and delays. In October 2015, Sberbank and Alfa Bank filed bankruptcy petitions against the air carrier. On September 13, 2017, the company was declared bankrupt.

According to investigators, Alexander Burdin, who acted as Transaero CEO from late 2015 to September 2017, embezzled over 1.3 billion rubles and paid no wages to employees for over two months. As a result, a salary debt to nearly 7,000 employees reached about 400 million rubles. Burdin pleaded not guilty.

On August 28, 2018, a Moscow court arrested Burdin in absentia. A court in St. Petersburg satisfied in March 2021 a move of the bankruptcy receiver of Transaero seeking to seize property of Burdin in the amount of 245 billion rubles.