Ranga IV goes to Lithuanian court in dispute with Nukem

Meanwhile, Nukem claims that the dispute should be heard by the arbitration court in Frankfurt, and not by a Lithuanian court.

“Nukem does not agree that the dispute initiated by the claimant should be heard by courts and believes that the dispute should be referred to the arbitration court in Frankfurt under the British substantive law,” Gintautas Stalnionis, a spokesman for Vilnius Regional Court, told BNS.

Gintaras Adomonis, Ranga IV bankruptcy administrator, confirmed to BNS that the suit had been lodged with the Vilnius Regional Court.

“We have initiated such proceedings. We seek to recover more than 19 million litas in debts,” he said.

The court on Apr. 27 turned down a request from Ranga IV to seize funds on Nukem’s accounts in SEB Bankas and other Lithuanian commercial banks as well as Nukem’s property rights arising from the contract signed with the INPP in January 2005. In total, Ranga IV asked to seize Nukem’s assets worth 16.643 million litas.

Nukem Technologies terminated the contract with Ranga on Jul. 1, 2010 and in August signed a contract with Vetruna, a Telsiai-based construction company. Unofficial sources told BNS that Vetruna had decided to suspend works at the INPP since it had not been paid by Nukem since the beginning of this year.

Nukem's arguments for terminating the contract with Ranga IV included alleged incapacity of the construction company to implement the project, its failure to pay wages to workers and to settle payments with subcontractors.