OREANDA-NEWS. VTB, the Russian state bank, has filed a lawsuit in the High Court of London against the Mozambique state company, with which it previously collaborated on a project that is currently at the center of a scandal over the sale of Mozambique debt obligations for $ 2 billion. This is reported by the American media with reference to a court document.

The respondents in this document are the state of Mozambique and its asset management, which took a loan of $ 535 million from VTB to implement a project that, in the opinion of the US authorities, is a carefully thought-out scheme for bribery and kickback. The lawsuit claims that the case concerns “general commercial contracts and arrangements”, but other details are not provided. The statement merely clarifies that the interests of VTB Capital are represented by the Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer law firm.

In 2013 and 2014, Mozambique borrowed about $ 2 billion from the banks of Credit Suisse, VTB and BNP Paribas for the purchase of coastline protection systems and vessels for tuna fishing. The funds were received by the republican state-owned companies Ematum and ProIndicus, as well as the Mozambique Asset Management state fund. The deal was led by Mozambique's finance minister Manuel Chang. According to investigators, he hid information about loans when he resigned in 2015.