MOSCOW, November 21. /ITAR-TASS/. Minsk officials have refrained from comments on a decision of the general-prosecutor’s office to extradite CEO of Russian potash producer Uralkali Vladislav Baumgertner to Russia.

“I cannot say anything so far,” a spokesman for the Belarusian prosecutor-general’s office, Pyotr Kisilev, said on Thursday.

The Russian embassy in Minsk told Itar-Tass the diplomatic mission had not been informed about this decision yet.

Lawyers of the Uralkali chief also did not make any comments.

Earlier in the day the Russian prosecutor-general’s office said Belarusian law enforcers would soon extradite Baumgertner to Russia.

Baumgertner was arrested in Belarus in late August on charges of power abuse and placed under house arrest in the Belarusian capital Minsk. Later the Belarusian Investigative Committee dropped abuse of power charges against him, replacing them with embezzlement.

The Russian Investigation Committee also initiated criminal proceedings against Baumgertner and sent an extradition request to Belarus. In October Moscow’s Basmanny court took Baumgertner into custody in absentia.

On November 19, Belarusian Foreign Minister Vladimir Makei said all formalities concerning Baumgertner’s extradition had been fulfilled.