Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko has signed a bill to amend Ukrainian laws on resolving several questions of the debt of state-owned Concern Ukroboronprom‘s defense enterprises to the aggressor country and/or occupying country and providing for their stable development, Ukrinform reports.
The law proposes mechanisms for protecting the economic activities of Ukrainian defense industry enterprises included in the list of state-owned assets of strategic importance for the economy and security of the state against the “negative impact of legal entities registered on the territory of the aggressor country and/or occupying country or legal entities with foreign investment of the aggressor country and/or occupying country.”
The law ends enforcement proceedings and enforcement measures for judicial decisions to recover debts from the listed enterprises. In addition, judicial proceedings in the case of bankruptcy of these defense enterprises are not allowed on claims filed by legal entities of the aggressor state and/or occupying state or legal entities with foreign investment or foreign enterprises of the aggressor state and/or occupying the state.
As reported, Ukraine’s Parliament, the Verkhovna Rada, on July 12 adopted at second reading and as a whole a draft law releasing the state-owned Ukroboronprom concern from contractual military-technical cooperation (MTC) obligations with Russia (draft law No. 6697).
The explanatory note refers to the decision taken by state leaders in 2014 to terminate MTC with Russia and cancel MTC contracts with Russia, because until 2014 it was impossible to appeal to Russian courts to recover debts, fines and other penalties, as well as for Ukrainian enterprises invoke force majeure provisions.
Ukraine in 2014 stopped exports of military equipment and dual-use goods to Russia, citing the latter’s illegal annexation of Crimea and invasion of eastern Ukraine. In the years that followed, Kyiv terminated a number of defense contracts and bilateral agreements with Russia.
