MOSCOW, December 20. /ITAR-TASS/. The searches are underway over a massive fraud of $1.2 billion at OJSC Rosselkhozbank in the Russian capital of Moscow and the Siberian city of Novosibirsk, the press centre of the Russian Interior Ministry told Itar-Tass on Friday.
“The detectives from the main department of economic security and counteraction to corruption in the Russian Interior Ministry have exposed the theft of more than 1.2 billion rubles of budgetary resources. The former employees from OJSC Rosselkhozbank and several top managers of commercial organizations involved in the speculation are suspected of a massive fraud,” the press centre reported.
According to operative reports, “in 2009 the offenders gave target credits from the bank to the affiliated enterprises of OJSC OGO of the Russian defense and industrial complex.”
More than 1.2 billion rubles ($36.4 million) were allocated for the purchase of agrarian raw materials and agricultural machinery. “Then the monetary funds were withdrawn from under the control of the creditor and the agrarian industrial company through the conclusion of false agency contracts and were misappropriated by the participants in the criminal scheme,” the press centre reported. Meanwhile, the borrowing companies, the assets of which are the collateralized property, are named bankrupt.
A criminal case upon massive fraud was opened. The investigation department of the Russian Interior Ministry is investigating the affair.
“The searches are underway at the offices and the residence places in Moscow and Novosibirsk. The objects and documents that can be used as evidence are being confiscated,” the press centre said.
Two enterprises incorporated in OGO Group, namely the factory of bakery products Novosibirskkhebprodukt and its subsidiary, the Novosibirsk flour mill number one operated in Novosibirsk Region, Russia’s Siberia.
According to the materials of the court of arbitration in Novosibirsk Region, in August 2009 the Novosibirsk flour mill number one has borrowed 1.2 billion rubles from Rosselkhozbank under the guarantees of Novosibirskkhebprodukt and the Sheksna factory of bakery products based in Vologda Region incorporated in the agrarian holding OGO. The borrower is to repay the credit before July 2012.
The property of the flour mill, including all its industrial premises with the land plots on which the mill is situated, was put in pledge to the bank. The flour mill failed to repay the credit.
In December 2012 the Novosibirsk court of arbitration has satisfied the lawsuit from Rosselkhozbank to the flour mill and the pledgers to the tune of 1.2 billion rubles. The panel of appeals has upheld the court verdict.
In April 2013, the Novosibirsk factor of bakery products and the Novosibirsk flour mill have initiated their own bankruptcy procedures. In November the arbitration court in Novosibirsk Region has introduced receivership at the Novosibirsk factory of bakery products for a period of one year and at the flour mill for six months until mid-May 2014.