On Friday, the capital's property department withdrew its claim to evict the Moscow Islamic University (MIU) from a building in Kirov Proezd. The department explains this decision by saying that MIU voluntarily evicted commercial subtenants from the building, whom MIU itself calls “friends of the university.” And the Chairman of the Council of Muftis, Ravil Gainutdin, who stood up for the MIU and turned to Mayor Yuri Luzhkov for support, said that “the department figured out that they made a mistake,” and “there simply cannot be a trial.”

On Friday, the head of the capital's property department, Vladimir Silkin, said that the department had decided to withdraw the claim from the Moscow Arbitration Court for the eviction of the municipal management unit. This happened just one day after the lawsuit was filed. “The university has eliminated the violation of the lease agreement, which was the reason for going to court,” explained Mr. Silkin. “The university will undoubtedly continue to operate in the same building.”

As Kommersant reported on February 9, the agreement between the property department and the MIU on renting a building in Kirov Passage until 2015 was concluded in 2002. At the same time, the university paid a minimum rental rate of 1 ruble. per sq. m per year. The agreement contained the condition that the MIU is engaged only in educational activities and does not have the right to engage in commerce. However, about 800 sq. m out of 3 thousand, the university subleased to several companies and, according to the property department, charged rent from them at commercial rates. However, the rector of the MIU, the deputy chairman of the Council of Muftis of the Russian Federation, Marat Murtazin, previously told Kommersant that the premises in the MIU were given not to subtenants, but to “friends of the university” who helped make repairs in the MIU building and equip the rooms with computer equipment.

The MIU does not comment on the news about the withdrawal of the claim. Mr. Murtazin told Kommersant that “he did not receive any documents confirming this.” The rector did not confirm the information about the eviction of “friends of the university,” however, he did not deny it either.

The Council of Muftis of Russia does not hide that the university was defended thanks to the appeal of the chairman of the council, Ravil Gainutdin, to the mayor of Moscow, Yuri Luzhkov. Immediately after filing the lawsuit, Ravil Gainutdin proposed to the capital’s mayor to transfer the building to the university “for free use or to maintain preferential terms of its lease.”

“I actually sent a letter to Yuri Mikhailovich (Luzhkov - Kommersant ) about this,” Ravil Gainutdin told Kommersant. “True, I have not seen the documents on the withdrawal of the claim, so the issue is not resolved yet. We renovated the MIU building at our own expense, got into debts, and they are kicking us out. If so, then let them return our money to us." In his address to Mr. Luzhkov, Ravil Gainutdin drew attention to the fact that “today the Islamic world is closely observing how Russia treats Islam, so it would be a big mistake to drive students out into the streets in winter.”

Let us note that the capital’s property department refused to confirm that the reason for the withdrawal of the claim was a letter from Ravil Gainutdin to Mr. Luzhkov.

Be that as it may, both the Moscow government and the Council of Muftis consider the incident to be settled. “I’m sure there can’t be a trial,” Ravil Gainutdin told Kommersant. “The property department figured out that a mistake was made.”

Andrey Kozenko, Pavel Korobov

Islamic University exchanged building for tenants