The Supreme Court ruled in favor of Russia in one objection. The Court of Appeal in The Hague wrongly ignored the Russians’ argument that Yukos shareholders had committed fraud in the arbitration proceedings.

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The Amsterdam Court of Appeal does not have to deal with this objection objectively, according to the interpretation of the ruling published Friday morning.

In 2020, the Court of Appeal in The Hague upheld the 2014 Arbitration Court ruling, which demands the Russian state pay $50 billion (transferred €43 billion) to the former Yukos owners. Russia has resumed this matter.

Surprise

The verdict may come as a surprise, since the prosecutor had previously advised the Supreme Court to reject all Russian objections. His advice is often followed.

Yukos, Russia’s largest oil company, went bankrupt in 2006 after billions in tax claims from the Russian government. Yukos head and Putin opponent Mikhail Khodorkovsky was arrested in 2003 and held in a penal camp until 2014.

Boris Yeltsin

Its owners began proceedings in 2005 at the Permanent Court of Arbitration in The Hague. There they summoned the Energy Charter Treaty (ECT), signed by Putin’s predecessor Boris Yeltsin.

Since then, both sides have made their way through Dutch courtrooms. Russia there mainly objects that the three arbitrators in The Hague have anything to say on the Yukos case, because the Russian parliament has never ratified the ECT treaty. The Supreme Court rejected this objection.