Volkswagen's Russian assets arrested

The Arbitration Court of the Nizhny Novgorod region arrested all assets of German automaker Volkswagen in Russia, Interfax reports.

Since March 17, Volkswagen has been banned from conducting any registration actions, such as actions to liquidate, reorganise or change the composition of participants, increase and decrease the authorized capital of the Russian subsidiary of Volkswagen and its legal entities.

Volkswagen's assets in Russia ere banned following a court appeal from Russia's GAZ automobile group from March 14. The document was published in the file of arbitration cases.

The group demanded collecting as much as 15.6 billion rubles from Volkswagen in damages for the termination of the contract assembly agreement in Nizhny Novgorod. The contract was valid until the end of 2025. In March 2022, Volkswagen publicly announced its decision to suspend the production of its vehicles in Russia, the lawsuit says.

Volkswagen stopped deliveries of vehicles to Russia, as well as production at the plant in Kaluga in the spring of 2022. Before March 2022, the plant produced Volkswagen Tiguan and Polo models, as well as Skoda Rapid. The capacity of the enterprise was estimated at 225,000 vehicles per year. Russian investment company AFK Sistema, as well as Avilon are believed to be potential buyer of Volkswagen Group RUS.