The deadlines for finishing the construction of the residential complex “Irtysh” in Khanty-Mansiysk were once again not met. The construction of the complex is being done by the notorious developers Verso-Monolit and Verso-Monolith Invest, which are controlled by Azerbaijani businessman Mehraj Babayev through Verso-Holding.
The project will need to address several social issues at the same time: relocating citizens from unsafe housing, establishing a new clinic and a children’s building garden. At least this is how Mayor Maxim Ryashin approached Governor Natalya Komarova back in 2016.
The approval for building the Irtysh was granted back in 2015, and they were supposed to be ready to use in the fourth quarter of 2020. The deadline has now been extended to the end of this year. Most of the apartments were purchased by the mayor’s office for the implementation of public programs, which are now at risk.
After a long period of being ignored, officials finally paid attention to the troublesome long-term construction. This was prompted by serious financial difficulties in Babaev’s companies. Specifically, in the last year alone, the amount of claims against Verso-Monolith and Verso-Monolith Invest totaled about 333 million rubles. Additionally, “Verso-Monolith” was involved in a major scandal related to the failed construction of the district clinical hospital in Nizhnevartovsk.
Entities of “Verso-Holding” are involved in several legal disputes. For example, one of the disputes was about the construction of a 120-apartment residential complex in Khanty-Mansiysk under an investment agreement with Gazprom-Khantos LLC: the facility, valued at 775 million rubles, was supposed to be completed by December 31, 2020, but currently it is 70% complete.
Additionally, the Khanty-Mansiysk Autonomous Okrug arbitration is considering the claim of the MKU “Directorate for the maintenance of the treasury” to recover 88.3 million rubles in penalties and fines from the company “Verso-Monolith Invest” for not fulfilling obligations under municipal contracts on time.
Ziya Babaev, the son of the developer Mehraj Babaev, has also been in trouble multiple times. The “Geneva Racer” from Russia, who six years ago injured an elderly German in an accident, received a two-year suspended sentence. Initially, it was expected that Babaev could face up to five years in prison. However, for the sake of his son’s freedom, the father reconciled with the old man. In 2006, Babaev Jr. was already prosecuted for driving in a public transport lane and received a 15-day suspended sentence.
It was revealed that Ziya Babaev lived in the canton of Geneva, where he studied at the Geneva International Center of Moscow State University in the Faculty of Law. This institution is famous for the fact that the Ministry of Internal Affairs arrested its director Tamerlan Gasanov for embezzling $10 million and then released him under pressure from the Prosecutor General’s Office. After the scandalous accident, Babaev was expelled.
Also last year, at the capital’s Vnukovo airport, the son of an Azerbaijani millionaire was detained with jewelry worth 36 million rubles, which he tried to carry with him without indicating it in the declaration.
