Audit conclusion of Gazprom recognized as invalid

The Moscow Arbitration Court rejected the suit filed by Riland (an owner of 12 million shares of Gazprom, a Russian gas giant), which demanded the court to recognize the audit conclusion of PricewaterhouseCoopers made on March 31, 2001 after this international auditor had carried out an audit of Gazprom's accounting reports of 2000, as invalid. At a court session, at which this suit was considered, the suitor demanded that PricewaterhouseCoopers, Gazprom and Stroytransgaz produced a number of documents.

In particular, the suitor demanded Gazprom, which acted as the third party in the case, to produce the original copies of the audit conclusion, the contract made between Gazprom and Itera Corporation on December 25, 1999 regarding selling Turkmenian gas, along with the confirmation of A. Bekker's status as a member of the Board of Directors of Gazprom and a number of protocols of the of the Board of Directors meetings. Pricewaterhouse Coopers declined to submit the requested documents to the suitor. The court rejected the suitor's demand to produce the specified documents. A representative of Riland Vadim Kleiner reported to RBC that the suitor was planning to appeal the four judgements about the invalidity of the audit conclusion of Gazprom's financial performance in 2000 at the Appeal and Cassation Courts.

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