Against Sistema: chronicle of the process of the largest claim of Rosneft. Bad War

The situation around the relationship between Rosneft and AFK Sistema is becoming increasingly conflictual. On June 26, AFK Sistema announced the seizure of its assets following a claim by an oil company. The latter’s representative, Mikhail Leontyev, said that the company will also seek security for the claim brought for a record amount of 170 billion rubles. The tough and uncompromising line of Rosneft management indicates that the company is ready to go to the end in this dispute.

Let us recall that Rosneft’s lawsuit against AFK Sistema was filed in early May. Then the company's shares lost 37% of their capitalization. Rosneft representative Mikhail Leontyev explained to RBC that “ we're talking about about organizational and financial manipulations that led to the depreciation of the asset by the specified amount.” The market perceived this news as a shock: both the amount of the claim and the aggressive manner of Rosneft created the impression that the company was going to “absorb” Sistema. For the federal official who participated in the privatization of Bashneft in 2016, the news about the possible claims of the state-owned company came as a surprise: “We did not notice any facts of withdrawal of funds from the company,” said a Vedomosti source.

The amount of the claim significantly exceeds the capitalization of the company itself: at the end of June it was approximately 135 billion rubles. If Sistema loses the trial, it will not be easy to pay: at the end of 2016, there were more than 60 billion rubles in its accounts. Analysts indicate that the company will have to take on debt and, if possible, use dividend proceeds from MTS. Now they amount to about 23 billion rubles. annually. You can also sell part of your assets.

Today, the rigidity of Rosneft’s position creates the impression that no compromises are acceptable for Igor Sechin. The company’s motives seem irrational, as the independent directors of AFK Sistema also wrote about in their address to Putin. However, the Kremlin, through the presidential press secretary Dmitry Peskov, made it clear that it would not interfere in the dispute, and the conflict should be resolved in court.

We can identify five key aspects of the conflict between Sechin and Yevtushenkov, which allow us to understand what is really happening within the framework of this dispute, and what it may ultimately lead to.

Firstly, unlike other major intra-elite conflicts in which Igor Sechin was involved, in the current situation there is no personalized interest of Vladimir Putin, or at least it is not as pronounced. So, if we take the history of YUKOS, then it was about a personal confrontation between the president and the head of the largest oil company, and the dispute was initially political, not economic, in nature, and Putin willingly and harshly commented on it. Igor Sechin, who oversaw the “YUKOS case” and eventually received management of the company’s assets (which went to Rosneft), played the role of ideologist and executor. However, it was Putin who was the initiator and source of political will.

In the current situation, we are talking about Sechin’s personal interest, and his motives are closely connected with the entire history of the Bashneft company, starting from the mid-2000s. According to one version, which looks quite convincing, in 2003 the Kremlin entered into a deal with the President of Bashkortostan Murtaza Rakhimov: federal center does not interfere with his re-election, subject to the return of fuel and energy complex assets to state ownership. However, these obligations were not fulfilled. In 2005, a new compromise political deal was renegotiated, according to which the assets were to gradually pass into the hands of AFK Sistema. As Alexey Kudrin said, this decision was agreed “with all levels of government.” However, such an agreement did not become a consensus for all participants in the process: the “revision” of the original deal and the sale of the asset to Sistema was perceived as unfair by Putin’s security circle, including Sechin. A criminal case was opened, which was then handled by the head of the legal department of the Federal Tax Service, Anton Ustinov, who acted with the political support of Igor Sechin. They almost managed to achieve a result, convincing the Moscow Arbitration Court in 2007 to return the enterprises to the state. However, success was prevented by the accession to the presidency of Dmitry Medvedev, during which the cassation instance suspended the execution of the decision, and in April 2008 the Supreme Arbitration Court limited the application of Art. 169 of the Civil Code (on the invalidity of transactions that contradict the fundamentals of law and order and morality) in tax matters. The key transaction was completed in 2009, when AFK Sistema received controlling stakes in Bashkir assets.

In 2014, Yevtushenkov was arrested, and Bashneft was eventually transferred to the authorities of Bashkiria. The media wrote a lot at the time that Sechin could have been behind the arrest, wanting to get not so much Bashneft as the Trebs and Titov fields, which were controlled by the joint venture of Bashneft and Lukoil. At the same time, the relationship between Rosneft and Lukoil also remained and remains conflicting. In 2016, Rosneft bought Bashneft during privatization, despite negative attitude to this deal on the part of the government and the presidential administration.

Thus, the story, which lasted more than 10 years, ends with the complete and unconditional victory of Rosneft. Moreover, it is important to understand that Sechin, who believed that Bashneft should have initially been returned to the state by Rakhimov, was forced to pay the market price for the asset, which in his logic may well look like an exceptional injustice that requires correction. Within the framework of this logic, Yevtushenkov, who controlled Bashneft, turns out to be a major debtor to Sechin. It is significant that at the first court hearing on June 27, a representative of Rosneft said that Sistema “milked Bashneft as if it were its own,” because it knew that it would soon lose it.

The second feature of the current situation comes from the first - the intransigence of Rosneft’s position. President of AFK Sistema Mikhail Shamolin told Interfax that the company offered Rosneft “an effective mechanism for out-of-court settlement of the dispute.” However, Rosneft said the next day that it had not yet received “anything that could be called proposals” from Sistema. Leontiev spoke very sharply, accusing Sistema of not wanting to sue: “Sistema’s position is only that under no circumstances do they want to sue. How can you talk to these people? About what?". Rosneft is determined to exclusively judgment dispute, and no compromise seems to be allowed. It is interesting that when Rosneft, among many companies and institutions in the world, was attacked by a computer virus, Mikhail Leontyev did not rule out that this was organized by Sistema with the aim of destroying important documents on Rosneft servers.

The third feature is the general politicization of Rosneft’s status. The company has always positioned itself as not just an economic entity, but as a nationally significant institution that plays a special role in terms of the country’s social, economic, and budgetary priorities. The purchase of Bashneft became possible largely due to the fact that Sechin was able to convince Putin that the company was able to ensure the largest flow of money into the budget. The sale of 19.5% shares was also a great success. The company that owns Rosneft, Rosneftegaz, was named by the president as a kind of fund from which educational and scientific projects are supposedly financed (despite the fact that for the most part we are talking about corporate projects of Rosneft itself). Rosneft also constantly emphasizes its exceptional importance in terms of the scale of replenishment of the Russian budget.

This statist status allows Rosneft to act not so much on the basis of corporate interests, but rather on the basis of state interests as Sechin understands it. This identification gives the company and its actions, including in the eyes of the Russian elite and Putin personally, special legitimacy. It is significant that when the independent directors of AFK Sistema turned to Putin, accusing Rosneft of irrationality and worsening the investment climate, Rosneft responded that, on the contrary, its lawsuit helps improve the investment attractiveness of Russia: it perceives the company’s actions as a kind of putting things in order.

The fourth feature is the weakness of legal institutions in Russia as a complex problem. This is an often discussed and already routinized problem, however, it remains fundamental for Russia, and its severity is getting worse. Very often, disputes between economic entities, and conflicts in general, are resolved outside of legal mechanisms, and in politically significant issues, the law adapts to the political decisions of the authorities. One of bright examples– the situation around the Kuchino test site in the Moscow region. The landfill next to which construction company Morton built housing projects and continued to operate despite its legally recognized illegality. Thus, back in 2016, the Balashikha City Court already satisfied the claim of the interdistrict environmental prosecutor’s office of the region to suspend the operation of the landfill. But despite this, the operation continued. Putin’s demand to close the test site, which was done the next day, occurred outside of any legal framework. And this situation is not exceptional, but rather traditional for Russia. In such a situation, it is difficult to count on a fair and independent trial, and an appeal to the president turns out to be almost the last hope.

Finally, the fifth feature of the story around AFK Sistema is that there is a limited use of power resources. This could probably be due to personnel changes, which occurred in the FSB last year, when the so-called “Sechin special forces” was disbanded, and an influential general close to Sechin, Oleg Feoktistov, went to work as vice president of an oil company. By the end of 2016, however, Feoktistov left Rosneft, and sources reported significant differences between him and Sechin. Indirectly, this may be evidence of the constant devaluation of the informal power resource of the head of Rosneft, which narrows the corridor of opportunities and forces him to look for non-repressive, but at the same time uncompromising ways to advance his interests.

Rosneft is acquiring a demonized image: the company is perceived as an institution that operates outside the law and the rules of the game, but at the same time enjoys the exclusive support of Vladimir Putin. However real opportunities companies, even taking into account its peculiarities, have their own pronounced limitations: the company is more often forced to act independently, without regard or significant assistance from the president, its power resource is split, and financial and economic opportunities are not limitless. At the same time, AFK Sistema found itself in a difficult situation when trial against it is perceived by the market not as an arbitration dispute between economic entities, but as a political campaign initiated by an ally close to Putin with unclear motives. All of this may eventually require presidential intervention again.

  – Head of the Analytical Department of the Center for Political Technologies

Corporate conflicts, like any quarrel, best reflect the character of the participants and general state environment. In these disputes, the parties demonstrate their fighting qualities and resource potential, and more importantly, through conflict we can evaluate the quality of the institutions that are supposed to regulate the rules of the game. Therefore, our research team regularly studies cases related to both social contradictions and business wars.

In order to understand how the expert community assesses the nature and prospects of the conflict related to the claim of Rosneft against AFK Sistema in the amount of 170 billion rubles, allegedly withdrawn from NK Bashneft in previous years, we interviewed about 30 expert officials, economists, lawyers, political scientists, editors of publications. None of them was a party to the conflict and therefore could claim an impartial position. And this is the overall picture we see.

The first thing that caught my eye was the complexity of the interviewing itself. A significant portion of respondents felt serious internal tension, when they were asked to speak about Rosneft, even on condition of anonymity. There was a feeling that Rosneft had acquired an image completely confined space surrounded by bare electric wire, which is better not to touch. It turned out that the majority of respondents’ answers characterized not a business structure, but a closed power center.

Rosneft has often been described in terms of a military camp, where every employee is a soldier, bound by strict discipline and hierarchy. Igor Sechin, who is rumored to start his working day at 5 am, keeps this entire mechanism under complete manual control.

The majority of respondents assessed the conflict with the “System” from a conceptual position: respondents questioned the presence of legal arguments in this conflict.

Sistema had an asset that the previous owner managed based on his ideas about efficiency: he reorganized something, sold it, entered into contracts. In general, these actions are guaranteed by property rights; the result of its management was included in the price of the asset when it was purchased by Rosneft. But, according to the logic of experts, Igor Sechin proceeds not so much from the legal side of the matter, but from conceptual points: oil was initially considered his sphere of influence, “System” should not have been included in this area. “He doesn’t buy a company, but a situation and tries to squeeze everything he can out of this situation, constantly raising the stakes,” says an expert in the field of corporate law. This, by the way, explains the strange symmetry: the size of the claims is close to the amount of dividends received by Sistema during the period of management of Bashneft.

However, as a number of sources assured us, Rosneft’s actions came as a surprise to Vladimir Putin. Experts on intra-elite conflicts noted that the head of state had no personal claims against Vladimir Yevtushenkov. As evidence, they point to Yevtushenkov’s participation in joint events with the president. There is an apocrypha circulating in circles around the Kremlin, according to which Vladimir Putin asked Igor Sechin to find a soft way out of the situation; allegedly, it was with this request that the remark of the head of Rosneft at the St. Petersburg forum was connected - “everything is possible.” In any case, experts note that Rosneft has become too powerful and an independent center of power, which carries risks for the balance within the political system.

“I’m not sure that Putin needs such a resource advantage in favor of one person from his team,” says a well-known political scientist.

Does this conflict affect the investment climate of the country as a whole? As you know, there are different points of view on this issue. This week, independent members of the board of directors of Sistema sent a letter to Vladimir Putin, in which they argued that a threat was being created to reduce the investment attractiveness of the national market. The Kremlin responded with the words of Dmitry Peskov, who said that he did not perceive such a threat. Our respondents were divided into three parts. One of them, in a relatively small number, argues that history will be localized in the space of relations between two subjects and will not affect the environment as a whole. How special case According to this hypothesis, government representatives interviewed argue that everything related to Rosneft must be considered separately from the rest of the economy. “This is a special case, let’s put it out of the equation,” says an employee of one of the relevant ministries.

The other two groups are formally different, but essentially similar. “The conflict will not affect the market in any way, since the investment climate is at an extremely low level,” say optimists. In their opinion, only exceptional people come to Russia exotic type investors, such as Qatari ones, for whom the only indicator is the price of oil. They no longer pay attention to everything else. However, pessimists insist that a bad precedent has been set. “We will definitely take this factor into account during privatization transactions,” says an interviewed investment banker. According to him, there is no longer any desire to understand what is now a matter of concepts and what is not: “You can enter the game and already as the game progresses you will see how the referee changes the rules.”

The assessment of the prospects for the conflict among experts also varies. It is assessed not from the standpoint of legal competition, but in the context of intra-elite agreements and decisions that will be formed in the Kremlin. “The conflict can be very long; It is quite possible that the parties will come to an amicable agreement, according to which Sechin will still receive something from Sistema’s oil service assets, which are located outside the boundaries of Bashneft,” says an industry expert. But, according to him, no one will undertake to make accurate forecasts: this is not the case when one can judge from open data.”

The assessment of this case made it possible to describe the public image of Rosneft in the investment market. The company is perceived through the logic of constant, unstoppable expansion, in which the price of the issue is no longer of fundamental importance. Rosneft each time absorbs a new asset, often more efficient in terms of the quality of management (TNK-BP, Bashneft), improves its performance due to it and moves towards a new expansion. When we compiled a map of corporate conflicts in the oil sector over the past 10 years, we saw that most of the stories were connected with Rosneft. Is such a concentration of resources necessary from an economic point of view? There is also no single answer.

"We see that whole line Rosneft's projects - the Arctic, the purchase of oil refineries in India, Venezuela - do not contain obvious economic efficiency, says the oil expert. “Of course, you can look at the company as an instrument of geopolitics. Igor Sechin wants to turn Rosneft into a second Gazprom, hence his conflict with Transneft over control of the pipeline, in which Nikolai Tokarev has so far won. Personal competition between Igor Sechin and Alexei Miller in front of the president plays a significant role,” explains the leading political scientist.

Experts largely agree that Rosneft’s choice of strategy is a special case of the state’s choice of strategy. Either it will develop a mobilization model that requires the utmost concentration of resources and manual control, or priority will be given to institutional development. The oil sector, as the main resource of the country, will serve the most accurate indicator this choice.

The Arbitration Court of the Republic of Bashkortostan published details of the settlement agreement concluded between AFK Sistema and Rosneft as part of the dispute over the privatization of Bashneft. The corresponding judicial act was published in the file of arbitration cases.

Under the terms of the agreement, which was approved by the judge, the defendants undertake to compensate Bashneft for losses caused in the amount of 100 billion rubles. (Case No. A07-14085/2017). 80 billion rubles. will be paid by AFK, and another 20 billion rubles. - "Sistema-Invest". The execution of the settlement agreement is divided into several stages.

First stage

By December 29, Sistema-Invest, a subsidiary of AFK, must transfer 20 billion rubles. to the account of Bashneft. In addition, part of this stage has already been completed - the bailiffs lifted the restriction on receiving income from 31.76% of the shares of MTS PJSC, 100% of the shares of the Medsi Group of Companies and 90.47% of the shares of BPGC JSC (Bashkir Electric Grid Company "). MTS has already announced the payment of dividends due to Sistema in the amount of 16.5 billion rubles. These funds will also be used to pay Bashneft.

Second phase

Until February 28, 2018, AFK Sistema must pay Bashneft another 40 billion rubles. The source of financing for this stage will be Russian Foundation direct investment (RDIF), which will provide the corporation with a loan secured by the shares of BPGC and Children's world", the arrest for which will be lifted by that time.

Final stage

The final stage of implementation of the settlement agreement will be the payment by Sistema of 40 billion rubles. until March 30, 2018. This payment will be financed by Sberbank on the security of MTS shares released from seizure.

Sistema's obligations will be considered fulfilled from the moment the last multi-billion tranche is credited to Bashneft's account. Once this happens, the parties will contact Federal service bailiffs to lift the seizure of other assets of the defendant company.

Within three days after this, Rosneft and Bashneft submit to the Bashkir arbitration court an application to abandon the second claim against Sistema for 131.6 billion rubles. - on dividends that the corporation received from Bashneft from 2009 to 2014 (case No. A07-38665/2017). The Ministry of Land Property of Bashkiria will also abandon a similar claim in case No. A07-38897/2017. In turn, AFK will drop the claim against oil companies for 330.45 billion rubles submitted to

Such a fierce corporate war, which has now unfolded between Rosneft and AFK Sistema, did not exist in Russia during any of Putin’s terms, including the prime minister’s. You can, of course, recall the YUKOS case, but there was a lot of politics in it, and formally it was a dispute between the company and the state. The division between the structures of Sechin and Yevtushenkov is akin to the great oligarchic wars of the nineties. And if there is politics in this war, it is purely as a tool, and the object of war is money and assets.

The main victim in this war, although it is not obvious at first glance, is the judicial system. Both sides make full use of their considerable financial and administrative resources. Sechin remains Sechin in any conflict, but Yevtushenkov is still not a “gladiator with a cardboard sword,” as he described himself in last word Alexey Ulyukaev. Yevtushenkov is an experienced, seasoned fighter, especially if the battle takes place in the arena Arbitration Court city ​​of Moscow. Let me remind you that the AGS did not accept the first claim of Rosneft against AFK, from which the conflict began, and the proceedings moved to Bashkiria, at the place of registration of Bashneft, which is both a co-plaintiff and a kind of material evidence. Bashneft cannot lose in its native republic, no matter who its owner is.

Vladimir Evtushenkov. Photo: RIA Novosti

Actually, the first stage judicial trial I was interested only in the final amount that AFK would be charged for the incorrect management of an asset that belonged to Yevtushenkov’s structures by right of ownership, from the point of view of the new owner. The amount turned out to be a little more than 136 billion rubles, and the parties assessed it differently. Rosneft is the final score, AFK is the starting point for downward trading. The bidding should have led to the conclusion of a settlement agreement, and a settlement agreement as a best scenario President Vladimir Putin spoke publicly about the way out of the clinch of two respected people. Moreover, the settlement agreement annihilates previously made decisions, and these decisions, it must be said, create in Russia a fundamentally new order, in which thought crime can be expressed in the possession of certain assets.

In this sense, the decision of the Arbitration Court of Bashkortostan, which absorbed the claim of Rosneft and, it seems, the comments of its official representatives, is, of course, a document of the era.

The logic is this: AFK could not help but know that it owned the asset in bad faith and, as a result, for a short time, and therefore did not have the right to dispose of it as an owner, for example, to carry out corporate reorganization. Or pay dividends. This is already a point from the second claim, again from Rosneft to the Arbitration Court of Bashkortostan. To secure this claim, approximately all of AFK's liquid assets were seized.

Once again, so that you understand the scale of the problem - not for Yevtushenkov, but rather for the country - the Arbitration Court of Bashkiria in a commercial dispute can arrest the shares of dozens of companies, including market leaders, throughout Russia.

At the same time, Rosneft does not hide that the main goal of filing a second claim is to force AFK to pay the entire amount under the first. The AFK considers this an abuse of right. And on the basis of this, they filed a lawsuit with the Moscow Arbitration Court, demanding 330 billion rubles from Rosneft and Bashneft.

You can, of course, say that this is a “return”. But for the arbitration justice system this is no less a challenge than the Bashkir claims of Rosneft. Because considering going to court as an abuse of right is also opening Pandora’s box. And the calculation of the amount of the claim, based on the drop in the company’s capitalization in Russian stock market, is more of a rhetorical device. By the same logic, a politician could sue for damages caused to his business reputation, based on data on the fall in his electoral rating according to VTsIOM.

The main risk of the situation is that if the country’s top political leadership does not intervene in the situation, then a scenario is quite likely in which Rosneft will win in Bashkiria, and AFK will win in Moscow.

Then we will have a whole series of resonant, precedent-setting and at the same time destroying the very foundations of justice.

But the intervention of a higher political power, frankly speaking, will not greatly help the triumph of independent justice in our country.

Apparently at the beginning fourth term Vladimir Putin will have to do the same thing he did at the beginning of the first one - equidistance and establishing basic rules of the game.

And most importantly executive director Rosneft, and in the public reaction of the head of Sistema. I am sure that a constructive outcome is not far off, albeit not without certain material costs for each of the parties.

On September 5, 2017, Vladimir Putin, during a press conference on the sidelines of the summit in China, spoke about the resolution of the main economic dispute of this year as follows: “I very much hope that they [Rosneft and AFK - N.K.] will be able to achieve a global agreements. And I think this would be beneficial for both companies and Russian economy generally".

In a short, verified formulation, several, as it is now fashionable to say, “signals” are quite clearly visible at once.

Firstly, the president, taking into account the decision to collect 136 billion rubles from Sistema to repay losses, is essentially calling on both sides to stop. In not the simplest internal economic conditions and, of course, against the backdrop of an extremely unfavorable foreign policy context, further escalation will harm not so much the companies themselves, but Russia as a whole.

Secondly, the very understanding of the settlement agreement, the parameters of which start from the 136 billion rubles appointed by the court, presupposes the putting forward of some acceptable initiatives on the part of the company whose assets are under encumbrance. And although Sistema has not yet formulated its vision of the settlement agreement, Rosneft, as follows from the interview with Igor Sechin quoted below, is ready for a constructive dialogue.

Thirdly, the president, speaking about the benefits of the “Russian economy as a whole,” apparently meant both the business climate in the country and, no less important, facilitating the continuation of the activities of AFK companies. First of all, this is, of course, MTS, the latest financial and economic decisions of which resemble a commercial panic on the eve of a takeover by a corporate aggressor.

I think it would be useful to repeat once again that government representatives and Rosneft management are categorically not interested in either the bankruptcy of Sistema companies or the transfer of ownership rights to stakes in AFK enterprises.

This week, Igor Sechin, in an interview with the Rossiya 24 TV channel, continued his line of justifying the importance of concluding a settlement agreement within the specified parameters, clearly holding the decision of the Arbitration Court in his hands, showing possible consequences“systemic” destruction and, what is no less, and perhaps more important, demonstrating the gaps in Russian corporate legislation.

Let's start with the fact that the court, as Igor Sechin said, agreed with the presence of such a significant circumstance of the case as “the defendants’ awareness of the illegality of ownership of shares in the Bashneft company and the need to return them to state ownership.” And further, “carrying out reorganization immediately before reclaiming shares in judicial procedure indicates the defendants' intention to use the corporate reorganization procedure primarily for the unlawful withdrawal of assets of a controlled company. This confirms the illegal nature of the defendant’s actions.”

After such a statement, it is logical to contact or contact, since to me personally the grounds for conducting at least a pre-investigation check seem obvious. However, it is not appropriate for a researcher to try on the toga of the head of the largest Russian state-owned company.

Let's continue. In the quoted interview, Igor Sechin reveals the essence of one of the possible subsequent demands: “AFK Sistema, being a shareholder, also withdrew accumulated dividends from Bashneft.” And specifically, about 133 billion rubles went to Sistema. This amount practically coincides with the volume of claims approved by the court of 136 [billion rubles], so we can confidently say that Sistema has the money and can easily pay off this court decision.”

At the same time, if AFK has already invested the illegally received dividends, Rosneft is ready to assist in organizing credit lines to repay the debt, “and such proposals have already been submitted to AFK Sistema by at least two financial institutions.” That is, there are no grounds for local shocks and cannot be.

It is impossible to talk about the emergence of a “precedent” in connection with the satisfaction of legal claims. The very history of personal enrichment thanks to manipulations with shares that Sistema used illegally is unprecedented. The behavior of AFK, as noted in the court ruling, is fundamentally at odds with general principles business turnover. This means that investors can reassure themselves about the potential risks associated with doing business in Russia.

Finally, another aspect of the conflict, this time mentioned by the vice president of Rosneft in an interview with the BFM radio station. We are talking about an unbridled PR campaign against the management of the oil giant and, more broadly, the Russian state institutions. “Sistema,” headed by the previously loyal Vladimir Yevtushenkov, after the start of the trial, relied on “Russophobic and Putinophobic hysteria, which is now extremely developed in the West, and even with the participation of our super-radical opposition, and clearly placed all its ordered materials, relying precisely on these resources".

The actual organizer of the “black PR campaign” is also named - Evgeny Chuikov, a professional PR specialist who was educated in London and worked at Pelham Bell Pottinger in 2006-2010. This company, recalls Mikhail Leontyev, was engaged in promoting the “Litvinenko case” with money under the control and guidance of the British intelligence services. “If Sistema is ready to talk about a settlement agreement,” concludes the vice president of Rosneft, “then all this disgrace must be stopped from now on.”

On the day when Vladimir Putin clearly indicated the need to conclude a settlement agreement, the head of the AFK, Mikhail Shamolin, called the words of the head of state “a guide to action.” I hope this was not a figure of speech, but a first step towards a productive conclusion to the discussion.