OREANDA-NEWS Naftogaz has secured the seizure of Gazprom's foreign assets in excess of the $2.56 billion awarded by the Stockholm arbitration, said the Head of the Ukrainian company Andrei Kobolev.

"We have already started to receive them: we write off the excess funds that Gazprom transferred to us for transit. Secondly, legal processes have already been initiated in about six jurisdictions. In three of them - in Holland, Switzerland and the UK - we will soon have hearings on forced sale. There have already been arrests of assets", - UNIAN Agency quotes Kobolev’s statements from an interview to the magazine "New time of the country".

He noted that he looks at this process "very optimistic".

"Gazprom has property worth tens of billions of dollars abroad. We have already arrested him for an amount exceeding the amount of Gazprom's debt to us. I think it can be done somewhere in the course of the year," – said the head of "Naftogaz".

In December 2017 and February 2018, the Stockholm arbitration ruled on disputes between Gazprom and Naftogaz regarding gas supply and transit contracts, eventually obliging the Russian company to pay $ 2.56 billion to Ukraine.

"Gazprom" the decision appealed against, but the early attempts at enforcement of these funds.

In September, the Swedish court of appeal overturned a ruling blocking Naftogaz's attempts to seize the assets of its Russian partner.

Gazprom intends to seek a review of this decision and challenge interim measures of protection against Naftogaz claims in Switzerland, Britain and the Netherlands.

In addition, in 2018, Naftogaz initiated a new trial, in which the company requires Gazprom to revise the tariffs for gas transit in 2018-2019 and compensate the "arrears" by about 11.6 billion dollars.