By: John Doe
Quinn Emanuel has secured an important arbitration victory for PrivatBank – an award of $327 million, including interest and costs, that the Russian Federation must pay our client for seizing its Crimean banking business in Russia’s 2014 invasion of the peninsula. The award in favor of PrivatBank, the largest commercial bank in Ukraine, was rendered by a senior arbitral tribunal and announced on Oct. 6 by the Permanent Court of Arbitration at the Hague. Credit for this victory goes mainly to a small team of associates who pursued justice for our client for more than seven years under the leadership of London partner Epaminontas Triantafilou, who argued the case before the tribunal. The associate team included (now partner) Hafsa Zayyan, Eirini Kikarea, and Eirini Tsoutsou, joined in the later stages of the case by Patricija Rukstelyte. The team also benefited from the guidance of Alex Gerbi, Co-Managing Partner of Quinn Emanuel's London office. Former associates Anna Tkachova, Ion Tzifras, Odysseas Repousis, and Tetyana Yaremko played important roles at various stages of the case as well. Leading Ukrainian law firm Asters acted as co-counsel to PrivatBank in the proceedings. The team achieved the complete dismissal of all of Russia’s objections, including as to the tribunal’s jurisdiction and the admissibility of the claims, as well as the valuation of PrivatBank’s lost assets. It did so while navigating parallel proceedings in England, Ukraine, and the Netherlands, and the many difficulties caused by Russia’s illegal invasion of Ukraine in 2022. The case arose from the massive asset seizures and destruction that followed the Russian invasion of Crimea in 2014 and led to multiple claims against Russia. A Quinn Emanuel team led by Triantafilou and Gerbi also won a $1.1 billion award against Russia for Ukrainian bank Oschadbank in 2018. Throughout the proceedings, PrivatBank remained steadfast in its pursuit of justice – not just after Russia’s illegal occupation of Crimea in 2014 but also through the ravages of the Ukraine war. In fact, the final hearing in The Hague began on the same morning in October 2022 that Russia launched its first major missile attack on Kyiv since that February’s invasion. PrivatBank’s main fact witnesses were in Kyiv at the time, scheduled to testify remotely. They braved bomb craters and power outages to appear for testimony, embodying the fighting spirit of the Ukrainian people in a time of great adversity.
