Claims against Russia in international courts have reached $99 billion
The amount of claims against the Russian government, brought in foreign arbitration courts, continues to grow by leaps and bounds.
To date, the total amount of lawsuits is approaching the $100 billion dollar mark, said the Russian Presidential representative, Harry Minh, speaking in the State Duma.
"Currently, 37 trials are underway in arbitration courts, and as part of these claims, lawsuits totaling $99 billion have been brought against the Russian Federation," Minh said.
The number of lawsuits, he said, has almost tripled in recent years. In particular, this is due to the "reunification of Crimea with Russia," Minh said.
"A few years earlier, this amount was more modest - $35 billion," he said.
The total volume of claims against Russia is almost equal to the size of the liquid part of the National Welfare Fund, which as of June 1, amounted to $116 billion dollars.
Hypothetically, the payment of claims will require 16% of the Russian Central Bank reserves ($605 billion), 38% of the revenue part of the federal budget (18.765 trillion rubles) and 30% of annual export revenues of the entire economy ($332 billion last year).
Half of the amount ($50 billion) of all claims is in the Yukos case.
After 10 years of consideration, the Permanent Court of Arbitration in The Hague, ordered Russia to pay compensation to former Yukos shareholders - Yukos Universal, Hulley Enterprises and Veteran Petroleum. The judges considered that Russia's actions against Yukos violated the Energy Charter Treaty, which Russia signed but did not ratify. Russia appealed the case stating that certain provisions of the document could not be applied to it as the Treaty was not ratified.
Two years later, The Hague District Court overturned the decision, but the higher court of appeal reinstated it. In May last year, Russia filed an appeal against the decision to the Supreme Court of the Netherlands. In December, the Supreme Court rejected an application to suspend the execution of the court decisions pending a review of the merits of the case.