Gazprom Appeals in Naftogaz Row Rejected
A Dutch appeals court has rejected a motion by Russia's Gazprom that contested its jurisdiction in enforcing an arbitration award to Naftogaz, the Ukrainian company said July 19.
With its rejection of the appeal on July 8, the Amsterdam Court of Appeal confirmed its authority over the recognition and enforcement of a decision by the Arbitration Institute of the Stockholm Chamber of Commerce in Dutch territory. In 2018, the Swedish court ordered Gazprom to compensate Naftogaz almost $2.6bn for violating gas supply and transit contracts.
The same day as the Dutch court ruling, a district court in Luxembourg dismissed a similar motion by Gazprom, Naftogaz said in a terse statement.
The Ukrainian company is seeking the arrest of Gazprom’s assets across Europe to put pressure on the Russian company to settle the arbitration award made by the Stockholm tribunal. Earlier this month, a British High Court issued a ruling preventing Gazprom from collecting $145mn in potential dividends from the Nord Stream gas pipeline, at Naftogaz’s request.
Meanwhile, Naftogaz said July 18 that gas transportation arm Ukrtransgaz had recorded a 25% spike in daily Russian gas transit as result of scheduled repairs at Nord Stream. The pipeline serves as one of the main routes for Russian gas supplies running to Europe, with an installed flow capacity of 55bn m3 per year. Ukraine's pipeline system is capable of transiting 120bn m3 of gas, but handled only 86.8bn m3 last year.