REGARDING INITIATION OF A NEW CRIMINAL CASE AGAINST FORMER LEADERSHIP OF OJSC TOGLIATTIAZOT AND ITS RELATED PARTIES

PJSC TOAZ considers initiation of a new criminal case against former leadership of OJSC Togliattiazot and its related parties, and arrest of Chairman of the Board of JSC Togliattikhimbank in this case and the statement made by JSC United Chemical Company Uralchem on that point a pre-planned operation with the participation of law enforcement authorities. The purpose of such actions is to put pressure on, first of all, the court handling the criminal case of 2012 in the Komsomolsky District Court of Togliatti as well as the employees of PJSC Togliattiazot and JSC Togliattikhimbank.

We regard such actions as illegal and pursuing the goals other than restoration of the rule of law. Note that these actions were taken immediately after the statement was made in the Komsomolsky District Court of Togliatti by the representative of PJSC TOAZ – lawyer Simachev regarding the pressure by Russia’s Investigative Committee on the employees of Togliattiazot PJSC, witnesses in the criminal case and lawyers rendering legal services for the enterprise.

Also, we believe that such planned operation is a result of a complete failure of the investigation held in the Komsomolsky Court for proving the indictment, and is caused by the desire to create a level of negativity upon taking the final verdict in the criminal case considered, to distract those following the course of the proceedings from the blatant violations of the law detected during the court proceedings in the Komsomolsky District Court of Togliatti.

We qualify the indictment brought against A.E. Popov and other parties, including the employees of PJSC Togliattiazot, the essence of which is cited by JSC United Chemical Company Uralchem in its press release, as absolutely illegal and unsubstantiated.

We consider the press release distributed by the minority shareholder of PJSC TOAZ – JSC United Chemical Company Uralchem to be based on distorted and false information. We bring the attention of all interested parties to the repeated hostile actions against the Company that have been being taken by that minority shareholder.

We are sure that the higher and supervising authorities will find that Popov and other persons are not guilty and that the accusations brought are absurd.