Russian businessman Vladimir Antonov, former co-owner of Lithuanian Snoras Bank, has filed in the Moscow Arbitration Court a lawsuit against Lithuania. The claim sums 40 billion rubles (over €540 million), informs Slon.Ru with the reference to Prime.
The claim was filed on 5th August, a preliminary hearing is appointed for 22nd September. The ex-banker claimed to recover over 40 billion rubles from Lithuanian authorities including nearly 20 billion rubles as a compensation for loss of goodwill. In his claim, Antonov also demanded to recognize the saying of president of Lithuania Dalia Grybauskaite as to be in contrary to fact; her words were published by Russian and Lithuanian media in 2011.
In 2011, Grybauskaite supported the decision of the government and National Bank of Lithuania to nationalize Snoras Bank, that’s even ‘hard to call Lithuanian’. She noted that the decision of the government helped to ‘prevent an impudent attack against the banking system’.
Snoras Bank was nationalized after regulators discovered a shortage of capital in the amount of nearly €300 million. The Bank was initially recognized a bankrupt, and in August, 2012, it was eliminated. Thus, Lithuanian authorities believe that Antonov and the other co-owner of Snoras businessman Raimondas Baranauskas abducted €500 million from the account of the bank, false reported and abused of powers.
In turn, Antonov and Baranauskas always denied the charge against them. Both of them left Lithuania in 2011 and lived in London since then. In July, 2015, the British Court arrived at a decision to extradite the two businessmen to Lithuania, after which they left Great Britain. According to Ltytas.lv, Antonov and Baranauskas now live in Russia.