An outspoken Kremlin critic could face the loss of a 25 per cent stake in Aeroflot, Russia's national airline, if his bank is refused a bail-out loan by the Russian state.
Aleksander Lebedev, chairman of Russia's National Reserve Bank, confirmed yesterday that he was in talks with VEB, the Russian state bank, for a $130m loan to stave off a margin call on a stake of about 25 per cent of Russia's national airline, which fell due last night.
"We've been trying, but I'm not sure if we've been successful, because the procedure is not very clear," he said in an interview with the Financial Times. "But we haven't been told no." (...)
Compared with these bail-outs, the $130m loan requested by NRB is minimal, but Mr Lebedev is also known for public criticism of the government and his past outspokenness may be complicating his negotiations with VEB.
In particular, Mr Lebedev owns Novaya Gazeta, one of the last in a dwindling number of newspapers that are harshly critical of the Kremlin.
He declined to say whether politics could be getting in the way of negotiations over the state loan. "How do I know?" he said.
If the Aeroflot stake is liquidated, it would potentially have a number of eager buyers. Russian Technologies, a state company run by Sergei Chemezov, a close ally of prime minister Vladimir Putin, has been steadily moving ahead with plans to consolidate Russia's airline sector by helping to create Russian Airlines, a competing national carrier.
