Russia: Attempted Arrest of Russian Planes in France "Provocation"Russia termed Friday's attempted arrest of Russian warplanes at the international air show in Le Bourget, France, a "provocation."Russian Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov told the Itar-tass Friday that Moscow is working hard to prevent consequences of this move, saying he hoped Russia could make joint efforts with the French authorities to counteract the provocation. According to Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Alexei Kudrin, French bailiffs acting on the request of the Swiss-based Noga Company, visited Russian representatives earlier Friday morning to the air show with a warrant for the arrest of Russian displaying warplanes. They showed a resolution of the Stockholm International Court aimed to seize a Su-30 fighter jet and a Mig-AT trainer as collateral for Russian government's claimed debt to Noga, the minister said. The two aircraft, which failed to appear in their normal places on Friday and was reported being moved into a restricted military area in prevention of the arrest, flew back to Russia later in the day. Kudrin said the Russian government will solve the Noga lawsuit problem in compliance with the national and international laws. "Our task is to defend the interests of Russia," he said, Russia's claims to Noga are much larger than its claims to Russia. The final decision will be taken at negotiations among the Russian Aerospace Agency, the Russian embassy in France and the French Justice Ministry, he added. The attempted arrest caused a storm of protests in Russia's political community, especially on the eve of French President Jacques Chirac's early-July visit to Moscow. Noga, which says Moscow broke barter deals in 1993 and owned it 800 million dollars, won an initial case against Russia at an international arbitration hearing in 1997 in Sweden. That ruling became applicable in France after a court ruling in March 2000 after which Noga obtained an order to seize 63 million dollars' worth of Russian state assets in France, including the bank accounts of the Russian embassy and its delegation at UNESCO. Russia is refusing to pay, declaring the Noga bills groundless. In March, an appeal court confirmed the original ruling, resulting in Friday's seizure. The seizure was an almost exact re-run of last year's seizure by French bailiffs of the giant Russian sailing-ship the Sedov, which was taking part in a seafaring festival in the Brittany port of Brest. |
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