AB Klaipėdos Nafta (the “Company”) received a ruling of the Court of Appeal of Lithuania of 17 June 2014 in the case according to statement of claim of the claimant UAB Naftos Grupė against the Company for the indemnification for losses of LTL 17 million allegedly incurred by the claimant, for return of surplus oil products allegedly belonging to the claimant and held by the Company to UAB Naftos Grupė and for recognition the termination of Service Contract No. 12-12-2005, dated 22 December 2004 (the “Contract”), due to the Company’s supposed fault.
The above-indicated ruling of the Court of Appeal of Lithuania partially reversed the judgment of the Vilnius Regional Court of 20 May 2013, which examined this case as the court of first instance, as follows:
(i) the provision of the Contract, giving the claimant UAB Naftos Grupė exclusive rights to transhipping vacuum gas oil, was admitted to be invalid while contradicting the imperative norms of Competition Law;
(ii) damages in the amount of LTL 2,988,341.14 and 6 percent annual interest on the awarded amount for the period from initiation of the proceedings (18 April 2011) till full execution of the court decision were awarded from the respondent (the Company) for the benefit of the claimant, that is only about half of the sum, which was awarded in favour of UAB Naftos Grupė by the decision of the court of first instance and the whole sum, claimed by UAB Naftos Grupė as compensation for loss of business, was fully rejected by the Court of Appeal, also
(iii) litigations costs were reallocated proportionally between the parties to the proceedings.
The said ruling of the Court of Appeal of Lithuania came into effect at the moment of its adoption, but it can be appealed against in the Supreme Court of Lithuania under the cassation procedure.
In the evaluation of the management of the Company, that part of the court ruling, which rejects the counterclaim of the Company to UAB Naftos Grupė in the case (on compensation of the losses of LTL 42,627,155 incurred by the Company while executing the Agreement) and leaves the above indicated amount of damages to be indemnified for by the Company to UAB Naftos Grupė, is groundless. Therefore, the Company is going to file a cassation appeal with the Supreme Court of Lithuania.
Mantas Bartuška, Director of Finance and Administration Department (+370 46) 391 763