02/04/2019

The cassation court refused to restore CHEMK's mine developing license

The partner AB "Pavlov & partners" Sergey Levichev comments the situation

The Arbitration court of the Ural district has left without satisfaction the appeal of the Chelyabinsk electrometallurgical plant (CHEMP) on the decisions of the lower courts. The lower courts recognized that orders of the Department of mineral resources in the Ural Federal district (Uralnedra) about the deprivation the company of the right of use of the Western mine in the Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous district were legitimate. The license was revoked in April 2018 due to the fact that CHEMP was not able to put the mining company into operation within the established time frame, as required by the agreement. According to experts, the reserves of the mine are estimated at 3-3.5 million tons of chrome ore. Experts believe that the cancellation of the license will be a serious blow to CHEMP's commodity independence.

The Arbitration court of the Ural district refused to satisfy the cassation appeal against the order of Uralnedra dated April 18, 2018 about the deprivation the company of the right to use the mine at The Western array of Ray-I in Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous region because of violation of the license conditions. As follows from the materials of the court, the plant was to put into operation a mining enterprise with a capacity of at least 300 thousand tons of chrome ore per year until December 30, 2014 on the territory of the field. However, CHEMK has not fulfilled its obligations.

CHEMP formalized a license for exploration and production of chrome ores in Yamal in July 2013. The previous owner was a company "North Nickel". The license expires in March 2026.

Partner of Pavlova & partners law office Sergey Levichev notes that if the Supreme court of Russia does not support the complaint of CHEMP, the plant will have the only opportunity to return the license — to re-buy it at an auction. "The subsoil legislation does not grant any privileges or discounts to the previous user during the auction procedures. The presence of licenses for neighboring areas does not allow the plant to carry out development on the site, the license for which was revoked," Mr. Levichev says. He notes that if a new subsoil user gets a license at the end of the auction, CHEMP will have the right to expect compensation for the costs of developing the field.

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Ирина Кошечкина

Юрист