The Ukrainian Security Service (SBU) is planning to file to court a case for damages caused to the state allegedly by executives of Naftogaz Ukrainy national oil and gas company.
"We will complete the investigation in the nearest future," SBU head Valeriy Khoroshkovsky said at a Friday press conference in Kyiv.
He said that it will take lawyers "no less than a month or a month-and-a-half" to examine the materials of the case after which it will be sent to court.
"There are classified episodes in the case. Today the lawyers are reluctant to get permission to examine them. Depending on how fast the lawyers proceed with studying the case it will be sent to court," Khoroshkovsky said.
He said that the reluctance of lawyers to get permission for access to classified information is "an attempt to drag out the investigation process."
He said that these materials may be assigned for separate proceedings or there other lawyers may be chosen who will be able to examine the documents.
"I cannot say what these documents are. Actually for this is the reason why the case is classified," he said.
The Stockholm Arbitration Tribunal on June 8 bound Naftogaz Ukrainy to return 11 billion cubic meters of gas to the Swiss-registered gas trader RosUkrEnergo and also to pay a commodity penalty in the amount of 1.1 billion cubic meters of gas to the company set by the contract. Khoroshkovsky then announced the opening of a case for damages to the state resulting from the Stockholm Arbitration Tribunal judgment.
So far, former head of the State Customs Service, Anatoliy Makarenko, former Naftogaz deputy CEO, Ihor Didenko, and former chief of the Energy Regional Customs, Taras Shepitko, have been arrested in relation to the case. Former deputy chief accountant of Naftogaz, Maria Kushnir, was detained in Russia.
