The Arbitration Court of the Moscow Region, at the request of the Prosecutor General's Office, introduced external management at Domodedovo Airport, transferring it under the control of Rosaviatsia, reported «Izvestia».
«A court process is underway, and the operational management of Domodedovo Airport has been effectively transferred to Rosaviatsia», — one of the sources told the publication.
The Prosecutor General's Office filed a lawsuit demanding the transfer of «DME Holding» shares to the state, which managed Domodedovo Airport before the start of the process. The supervisory authority believes that the beneficiaries of «DME Holding», Dmitry Kamenshchik and Valery Kogan, having foreign citizenships, illegally managed the assets of a strategic enterprise and transferred multimillion-dollar profits abroad.
In October 2024, seven companies involved in the management of the airport came under the ownership of «DME Holding». Previously, they belonged to the Cypriot DME Limited, which was controlled by one of the airport's co-owners, Dmitry Kamenshchik. The second beneficiary of «DME Holding» is businessman Valery Kogan.
The Prosecutor General's Office believes that Kamenshchik and Kogan merely sought to create a «false appearance of the absence of foreign control over strategic enterprises». Moreover, as the Prosecutor General's Office claims, the Federal Antimonopoly Service was not informed about Kogan's status and his Israeli citizenship. The businessmen were accused of following the «aggressive policies of Western countries aimed at inflicting strategic defeat» on Russia.
Sources from «Aviatorshchina» claim that Domodedovo will first be transferred to Rosimushchestvo, and then to an enterprise created by Rosaviatsia. However, market participants and the media are already discussing potential buyers of the assets of «DME Holding», in case they are put up for sale. One of the interested parties mentioned is entrepreneur Arkady Rotenberg — a close friend of Putin, who is a shareholder of Moscow's Sheremetyevo Airport.
This is not the first attempt by the authorities to nationalize Domodedovo. This issue was previously raised when a criminal case was initiated against the owner of Domodedovo, Dmitry Kamenshchik, following the 2011 airport terrorist attack, which killed 37 people. In February 2016, he was detained and placed under house arrest, but the case was soon closed due to the absence of a crime.