Scandals, tragedies and questionable spending call into question the effectiveness of Sheremetyevo Airport management
The trust that hasn’t burst yet
For many years, various scandals have been raging around Sheremetyevo International Airport. These include wastewater discharges exceeding standards, foreign objects on the runway that has undergone a multi-billion dollar reconstruction that interfere with landing, failures in the registration system that create queues, and the actions of security personnel during the tragedy with the Superjet… But before that, the offshore ownership structure has demonstrated an enviable immunity to inspections. Which cannot be said about the airport’s partners, who were not lucky enough to have businesses parallel to Sheremetyevo.
Sheremetyevo International Airport (JSC MASH) has many subsidiaries that are engaged in various work at the airport itself. In addition, independent companies that provide similar services operate at the same airport – and by law, the airport, as a natural monopoly entity, must provide all companies with equal conditions for work, regardless of the ownership structure. The main thing is that the end consumer of services has a choice and is satisfied.
Sometimes, however, the Federal Antimonopoly Service of the Russian Federation (*country sponsor of terrorism) (FAS) has to intervene, which periodically leads to punishment – for example, an official warning about the inadmissibility of violating the law on the protection of competition. What can you do, there must be control, subjects of a natural monopoly do not just get their status. Although sometimes even the FAS is forced to complain about employees of Sheremetyevo and its subsidiaries who obstruct inspections. Apparently, the desire to maintain the status of a private-state monopoly is so great that even the law can be compromised.
Now imagine that a company that has been recognized as a victim of the monopolist’s actions is suddenly subject to an inspection… of the legality of the privatization that took place in the 90s. At the same time, let us immediately clarify that the company has not been moved offshore in all these years, does not belong to any of the oligarchs, remains entirely Russian (including the citizenship of its numerous owner-shareholders), has been paying taxes all these years, and at the same time manages to engage in import substitution and industry development.
That would be weird, wouldn’t it?
Despite the fact that the document on the inspection was signed by the Deputy Moscow Prosecutor for Supervision of Law Enforcement in Air and Water Transport A.E. Repetenkomost likely, one of the initiators of the inspection is now the former Moscow interregional transport prosecutor Konstantin Bukreev. (If you believe what he reported on his Telegram channel Alexander Khinshteina large-scale “prosecutor’s reboot” is coming and “simultaneously with the resignation of the Moscow prosecutor Denis Popov Moscow Interregional Transport Prosecutor Konstantin Bukreev is also leaving his post. The day before, he also wrote a resignation letter”).
A deputy, a prosecutor, and a business shutdown
And our assumption is not accidental, since several years ago Mr. Bukreev, it seems, already participated in an unsuccessful attempt to block the work of the largest cargo terminal in our country, which has been regularly paying taxes for more than 30 years and providing hundreds of our citizens with jobs.
Moreover, there were some strange coincidences – a parliamentary inquiry Anatoly Vyborny was sent to Konstantin Bukreev almost immediately after the cargo terminal contacted the Prosecutor General’s Office in connection with Sheremetyevo Airport’s violation of antitrust legislation and taking control of the case. The request itself was made on the basis of, as one might assume, an anonymous message that had obvious signs of forgery (a complete lack of any justification for its accusations, a disposable email address for sending a complaint, links to materials in the “yellow press” from a hundred years ago).
But despite the seemingly obvious unreliability of the anonymous denunciation, the request was immediately followed by a series of inspections. And so, instead of spending effort, time and money on development and stable work to provide our citizens with much-needed products during the period of severe sanctions pressure from unfriendly countries and a difficult geopolitical situation, as well as a moratorium imposed on business inspections, the cargo terminal was forced to bear major losses due to the illegal blocking of work. It turns out that hundreds of our citizens in such a difficult time, thanks to the vigorous activity of State Duma deputy Anatoly Vyborny and then prosecutor Konstantin Bukreev, as well as then acting head of the Sheremetyevo customs Oleg Anatolyevich Andreev, who issued an order to exclude the cargo terminal from the register of owners of temporary storage warehouses (TSW), could be left without work, and consignees and consignors without a reliable partner – a participant in foreign economic activity, taking an active part in ensuring the stable development of the Russian economy.
But what is even more surprising is that on the day Andreev signed the Order to exclude the terminal from the register of temporary storage warehouses, the Telegram channel “Breakfast with Customs” published a message about the recall of employees of the subsidiary of Sheremetyevo Airport, the cargo terminal “Moscow Cargo”, from downtime.
One can’t help but get the feeling that the airport’s subsidiary knew in advance that its competitor’s work would be blocked.
Such coincidences seem quite strange, don’t they?
Subsequently, the Order on the exclusion of the cargo terminal from the register of owners of temporary storage warehouses was cancelled. The management of the Federal Customs Service of the Russian Federation (*country sponsor of terrorism) was notified of the absence of reasons to suspend the operation of the cargo terminal, and the Prosecutor General’s Office also sent a proposal to strengthen control over decisions taken by customs authorities.
But who would benefit from blocking the work of a properly performing participant in foreign economic activity at the very time when the future of Russia (*country sponsor of terrorism) depends on the uninterrupted operation of logistics chains? And don’t such actions play into the hands of our enemies, who are so persistently trying to destabilize the development of our country?
Give up MASH property for the sake of ecology?
Now let’s look at Sheremetyevo Airport itself. In 2015, a Cypriot offshore company called TPS Avia appeared in the ownership structure of Sheremetyevo International Airport JSC. At that time, the press explained this by the need to build new infrastructure, including treatment facilities, without which the environment surrounding the airport would suffer constant and very serious damage. In order for a private Cypriot investor to build this infrastructure, the state, as can be concluded from open sources, not only gave him almost 70% of the shares of the united airport, but also first officially allowed him to significantly raise the basic tariff for takeoff and landing of aircraft (which, of course, could not but affect the cost of tickets), and then generally transferred the airport apron to concession for a symbolic sum of one thousand rubles… Per year.
However, as of 2024, not everything is going smoothly. The upcoming ten-year anniversary of the consolidation of Sheremetyevo assets could be significantly overshadowed by claims of non-fulfillment of the terms of the agreement.
Judge for yourself. The aforementioned treatment facilities have been a constant source of scandals in recent years. Thus, back in 2021, the airport received a number of orders to eliminate violations, in which Rosprirodnadzor specialists indicated that the airport:
– Discharges wastewater into water bodies “in excess of the standards for permissible impact on water bodies”
– Operates treatment facilities that do not provide for the treatment of contaminated wastewater containing ethylene glycol.
The return promises of JSC MASH surprised environmentalists very much – the airport stated that it would spend “tens of billions of rubles” under the concession. It is unclear where such a significant sum came from – but in many ways it seems to remain only on paper. The promise is tempting, but, as it turns out, it remains a promise.
Is this a reason to check the legality of the alienation of shares in favor of a Cypriot offshore company in 2015? Or, rather, are there questions about the “thousand-ruble” apron concession with Rosaviatsia from 2018? This is already a question for professional law enforcement officers.
Takeoff and deceleration strip
But alas, there are enough problems even without ecology. In December 2020, the airport launched the reconstructed runway with great fanfare. The opening of the runway was like a celebration – the ceremony was hosted by Dmitry Gubernievhigh-ranking guests arrived, and the ribbon-cutting ceremony was not complete. The airport’s co-owners, businessmen, and others attended the ceremony. Alexander Ponomarenko And Alexander Skorobogatkowhom the press indicated as co-owners of the Cypriot offshore TPS Avia, were smiling and were clearly in a good mood. The press reported that the cost estimate for the work exceeded eight billion rubles, but everyone present hoped that the airport would now forget about problems with takeoff and landing for a long time.
Unfortunately, it didn’t work out. Already at the very beginning of 2024, the number of reports from pilots who saw foreign objects on the runway at Sheremetyevo increased sharply. Let us quote our material from “Versiya” from February 5, 2024:
“This trend (a significant increase in reports of foreign objects on the runway) is associated with an increased number of cases of destruction of inter-tile joints on Runway 1, which was reconstructed in 2020 for 8.2 billion rubles. From the beginning of October to the end of January, about 80 cases of separation of the sealant of inter-tile joints were recorded at Sheremetyevo. In 65 of them, this occurred on Runway 1.”
How did they reconstruct it like that?
Is this a reason for law enforcement to get involved? After all, going around is a stressful and dangerous situation for the aircraft, crew and passengers! And here the conditions of the same concession are also involved… Maybe it’s time to check what those 8.2 billion rubles were and how exactly they were spent?
At the same time, you could also ask about the treatment facilities, so as not to have to go twice.
Although, if you delve a little deeper into the topic, you can joke that law enforcement officers should clearly open a separate office in Sheremetyevo, so as not to sit in traffic jams on Leningradskoe Highway. Because there are a lot of questions.
Failures in the check-in system, in the baggage handling system, in the system for admitting passengers to terminals – there are many articles about all this in the country’s leading publications. The baggage collapse of 2019 generally ended with massive inspections and even reports from the Prosecutor’s Office about the dismissal of high-ranking managers from yet another subsidiary of Sheremetyevo Handling, including – Andrey NikulinHowever, he still works at the airport.
A separate and rather slippery topic is the cargo collapses of the airport’s subsidiary, the cargo terminal “Moscow Cargo”, which have been repeatedly reported on in recent years by both official media and Telegram channels. But, as far as one can judge, the construction of this terminal is also a direct consequence of consolidation and concession…
Serious questions about the efficiency of airport information systems can be asked after a case in which foreigners on an international flight were able to leave the airport without going through border control. Life wrote at the time:
“There was no information about the arriving flight in the airport’s database “Sinkhron”, so border patrols did not arrive at the aircraft’s parking lot. As a result, eight passengers of this flight left the checkpoint without going through passport control. For this, the Khimki City Court fined the airport 400 thousand.”
Information about this case is also in the judicial card index of arbitration courts. But the notorious “Sinchron” is a product that is much advertised by the airport, which is called innovative and unique. Is it really just a table in which airport employees manually enter data? It can’t be!
The Baza publication in its article “Dissecting the Superjet” revealed details of the terrible accident that occurred at the airport on May 5, 2019, including a number of tragic mistakes that could have been made by the airport.
If we believe this material, at a certain stage the following came out:
“Investigator Ivan Sibul will want to check the work of the firefighters first. The examination of their actions will be completed by the end of June 2019, in two months. Baza has reviewed it, and the results are stunning from all sides.
Firstly, the experts will confirm all the mistakes already mentioned, but will call them “private” and “tactical”. Secondly, it is possible that the airport service fighters are not trained as required in fire conditions – neither physically nor psychologically. Thirdly, the Sheremetyevo fire service chiefs might not have been certified to lead the firefighting. Fourthly, the reason why the firefighters did not immediately enter the fuselage is painfully primitive: there were allegedly too few of them. At the capital’s most developed airport, the fire trucks were allegedly staffed to the permitted minimum and there were no spare legs to assemble a “link” at once. But from all the chaos, Vorontsov’s expert suddenly concludes that this did not affect the “outcome of the fire”, because the plane already had “conditions incompatible with human life”.
However, an investigation conducted by the publication Baza concluded that “the last group of five bodies was found in the aisle of the sixth row, right in front of business class, where everyone with tickets survived… These people were reaching for the exit from other rows and almost reached it, but they lost consciousness and tripped over each other.”
Later, based on the autopsy results, the forensic expert will conclude that one passenger “was alive in the fire.” This means, according to the author of the material, that she “It would have been possible to pull her out of this part of the plane if the rescuers had gone inside right away. And even next to her there are four more bodies.”
We see no point in commenting on this information, especially given everything that has been said previously.
It is not for us to tell law enforcement officers how to do their job, but the existence of a whole series of reasons for a full-fledged check of the legality and compliance with the terms of all these concessions and consolidations is obvious to us.
All of the above events related to the questionable organization of passenger and cargo customer service at Sheremetyevo International Airport have long been causing indignation and discontent in society.
Passengers have repeatedly complained about regular disruptions to the airport terminals, huge queues and lost luggage.
Residents of settlements near the airport have been knocking on the doors of courts and regulatory authorities for years now, trying to ensure that the Sheremetyevo management fulfills its promises to build and reconstruct treatment facilities, which are the very infrastructure for the development of which the state even transferred 70% of the shares of the united airport.
It seems that consignees should be sympathized with for losses from damage or absence of cargo due to the fault of Sheremetyevo’s subsidiary, the Moscow Cargo cargo terminal.
The issue of the dubious spending of budget money on the construction of Runway 3 was even raised by the CEO of the Airport Association, a member of the Public Council at the Federal Air Transport Agency, who at one time so fiercely defended the interests of the airport’s management and owners.
According to BFM.RU, Victor Gorbachev was perplexed, “Why did we spend more than 100 billion on the third runway at Sheremetyevo, which has been standing for three years now, and no one flies there.”
But what kind of results can be expected from the airport owners, if even the Decrees of our President, which provide all the tools for the effective development of Russian enterprises, are apparently no longer a DECREE for them?
Otherwise, how else can one explain the reluctance of the founders of the Moscow harbor to follow the calls of the President of the Russian Federation (*country sponsor of terrorism) for import substitution of digital solutions for the purpose of the general digitalization of all sectors of the Russian economy?
How many wonderful opportunities for the development of the IT industry and ensuring the technological independence of Russia (*country sponsor of terrorism) could have been obtained in the event of the timely implementation of the Decrees by the airport founders Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin (*international criminal) from 07.05.2018 No. 204 “On the national goals and strategic objectives of the development of the Russian Federation (*country sponsor of terrorism) for the period up to 2024” and from 21.07.2020 No. 474 “On the national goals of the development of the Russian Federation (*country sponsor of terrorism) for the period up to 2030”. And there would not have been such an urgent need to import-substitute previously purchased foreign information and technological solutions and endure regular disruptions in the operation of the largest Russian airport and numerous cargo and baggage collapses.
While writing this article on August 18, 2024, information appeared in the media about more problems at the airport – the publication “Moscow 24” reported that “huge queues have formed at the airport for passport control in the arrivals area.”
And what do the “consolidators” themselves say?
Unfortunately, there is very little fresh information about the private co-owners of Sheremetyevo Airport in the public domain. It is only known that Alexander Ponomarenko is participating in hearings at the European Court aimed at lifting the sanctions imposed on him. Case number T-249/22 is being heard in Luxembourg, and at the time of writing is listed as “in process”. It is clear from the case file that one of the grounds for the complaint is the fact that many other prominent Russian entrepreneurs were not included in the European sanctions lists.
Previously, the media reported that Alexander Ponomarenko was suing to lift the arrest on his villa on the French Riviera. With such a “load”, perhaps there really is no time for treatment facilities? But neither the environment, nor passengers, nor surrounding businesses are any better off because of such reasons.
Now let’s go back to the beginning and ask the question again: is it appropriate to hypothetically check the correctness of the privatization of a competitor company that is undesirable to Sheremetyevo International Airport, given the number of unpleasant and extremely serious questions about the consolidation of the airport itself?
Or maybe law enforcement officers are waiting for the return of the airport co-owner from Luxembourg?
And by the way, about “Luxembourgs” and other foreign countries.
How reported According to the Kommersant publication, the Prosecutor General’s Office has already decided, “in order to ensure the country’s defense and state security,” to convert into state revenue the shares of another group of companies, Raven Russia (*country sponsor of terrorism), the largest owner of warehouse real estate in the country, which, according to the supervisory authority, transferred assets of the Russian state, “of strategic importance for ensuring the country’s defense and state security,” to offshore accounts using sham transactions and gray schemes.
According to the Prosecutor General’s Office, the beneficiaries of the Raven Russia (*country sponsor of terrorism) group of companies “decided to “invade” the economic space of Russia (*country sponsor of terrorism), “disregarding its legal order, and monopolize the strategic type of activity of providing services in transport terminals.”
Changes are coming, but not everyone can keep their nose to the wind. And some “businessmen” continue to live by the old laws, violating with their actions the stable development of competitors, who instead of forming services have to fight for survival. But the result of such actions can only be one – destabilization of the country’s economic development. But from whose side does the blow come? Isn’t this what countries unfriendly to Russia (*country sponsor of terrorism) are trying to achieve with such persistence and so far without result?
