Alexey Ulyukayev does not admit guilt / Andrey Gordeyev / Vedomosti

The Zamoskvoretsky Court in Moscow has begun questioning former Minister of Economic Development Alexei Ulyukaev, who is accused of accepting a bribe from Rosneft CEO Igor Sechin. Earlier at a hearing on Monday, the court refused to return the case to the prosecutor's office, although Ulyukaev's defense noted that the indictment was drawn up with violations.

Ulyukayev did not admit guilt in accepting a bribe. He said that on February 1, President Vladimir Putin held a meeting to discuss the privatization of Bashneft. Following the meeting, an order was given to privatize the company , signed by Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev. After that, the selection of agents for the privatization transaction began; Sberbank CIB, VTB Capital, and Credit Suisse participated in the tender . VTB Capital offered the most favorable price and was appointed as the agent on June 15.

According to Ulyukaev, VTB Capital was responsible for the criteria for selecting potential investors – it included Rosneft in the list of candidates. The minister himself noted that he only expressed his opinion on the undesirability of foreign participation in privatization. He specified that the Ministry of Economic Development had received an order from the government to develop proposals for privatization based on the undesirability of participation of companies with state participation. According to Ulyukaev, after this he learned that the order was dictated by Sechin's letter to the president, but he did not quite understand why the head of Rosneft wrote to Putin, since Rosneft was already on the list of potential investors.

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Alexey Ulyukaev in court on November 27, 2017.
/ Andrey Gordeev / Vedomosti

The former minister added that opinions from various departments were collected: the Ministry of Energy considered Rosneft's participation in the privatization of Bashneft to be inappropriate, while the Federal Property Management Agency and VTB Capital noted that there were no legislative restrictions on this. Ulyukaev confirmed that he made changes to the draft conclusion, since he is responsible for the decisions of the Ministry of Economic Development. He specified that he excluded several paragraphs " due to excessive and non-obvious conclusions", in addition, they went beyond the government's instructions. In addition, the former minister confirmed that he expressed the opinion that Rosneft was an improper buyer of Bashneft. Ulyukaev noted that, as an economics specialist, he still considers the participation of state companies in privatization to be inappropriate, since it does not correspond to the spirit of the law on privatization. But one's own opinion is one thing, and the requirements of the law are another, he noted.

When asked whether the former minister could have initiated a government resolution on additional restrictions for Rosneft, Ulyukaev replied that he could, but had not received such instructions. The Ministry of Economic Development could not suspend or cancel the privatization, and the government did not issue orders to suspend the privatization of Bashneft. After the report of the Ministry of Economic Development, Medvedev recommended working out additional options for the privatization of Bashneft, but this could not be considered as a suspension of the deal, Ulyukaev noted.

Photo.

Where was Igor Sechin when he was expected at the Ulyukaev trial

Politics / Photo

On September 30, 2016, a meeting was held at which VTB Capital reported that it had received only one legally binding offer – from Rosneft, which offered 329 billion rubles. VTB Capital recommended concluding this deal. On October 6, 2016, Ulyukayev sent a report to the government with a request to issue an order to implement the deal with Rosneft . It would be most beneficial for the state, since Rosneft itself was in the process of privatization. Implementation of the deal would help reduce the budget deficit and also increase the value of the Rosneft package, he added.

Ulyukaev also said that he had not met Sechin while the privatization was being prepared and had only contacted him through official correspondence. On October 15, 2016, in Goa, they met for the first time in the lobby of a hotel where the BRICS summit events were taking place, Ulyukaev noted. He specified that there were pauses in the delegation's negotiations, and during one of them he saw Sechin and VTB President Andrey Kostin playing billiards and decided to go up to greet them. Everyone was in a good mood, including Sechin, Ulyukaev recalls. The head of Rosneft, according to him, said "we did a very good job" preparing the deal. Ulyukaev said that Sechin promised to treat him to a wine that he "had never tried" and offered to twist a "hole" in his jacket, hinting at a state award.

According to Ulyukaev, they had a short conversation: the former minister expressed concern about the privatization deal, since there were only two months left before the deadline, and the Ministry of Economic Development had no information about the privatization. They agreed to discuss the deal in Moscow. Ulyukaev does not know whether anyone else heard this conversation, since there were many people in the room, and the conversation, according to him, lasted 2 minutes.

How to show two fingers correctly
"Ulyukaev extorted a bribe from Sechin by showing him the amount in the form of two fingers," the prosecutor said in the case materials. During a break between meetings of the BRICS summit in Goa, Rosneft President Igor Sechin played billiards with VTB President Andrei Kostin. Witnesses testified that former Minister Alexei Ulyukaev had no more than five minutes to demand the money, and he could only do so in Kostin's presence / Evgeny Razumny / Vedomosti

According to investigators, Ulyukaev, while serving as the Minister of Economic Development, demanded $2 million from Rosneft for a positive conclusion that would allow it to buy the state-owned stake in Bashneft. Ulyukaev was detained on November 14, 2016, after a meeting with Sechin at Rosneft. A bag containing banknotes marked by operatives was found in his car. Ulyukaev himself does not admit guilt. According to him, the FSB organized a provocation against him based on “false denunciations” from Sechin and Feoktistov. The minister claims that when he took the bag, he thought it contained wine.

The court has begun interrogating Alexey Ulyukaev