On Wednesday 7 March 2012, ship operator Star Reefers commenced contempt proceedings in High Court in London against Russia's largest fruit importer Joint Fruit Company (JFC).
The move includes action against JFC's directors and officers Vladimir Kekhman, Andrey Afanasyev, Dmitri Kasatkin, Vitaly Podolsky, Yulia Zakharova, Tatiana Litvinova and Oleg Dobronravov, for an alleged breach of the High Court’s world-wide freezing order that was issued by the English High Court in December 2011.
'Star Reefers will continue to pursue its claims robustly against Mr Kekhman and his JFC Group of companies based in Russia and world wide,' said Star Reefers' CEO Simon Stevens. 'Star believes that Mr Kekhman and the directors of JFC have breached the conditions set out in the English High Court's world wide freezing order granted in December 2011, placing them in contempt of court and liable for court sanctions.'
According to Star, if JFC and its directors are found to be in contempt of court, they may face unlimited fines and sequestration of their property and also the imprisonment of the company directors/officers.
It has been a turbulent few weeks for JFC, which filed for bankruptcy in February in order to protect its creditors and keep its sizeable business operations afloat following ongoing global economic unrest and, in particular, the impact of the so-called 'Arab Spring' on its Mediterranean operations.
