EPAM Litigation Practice Team has successfully defended a publishing house, a member of Gazprom-Media Group, in a defamation lawsuit, by convincing the Ninth Arbitrazh Appellate Court to set aside the trial court judgment. 

The claim was filed with the Moscow Arbitrazh Court by one of the largest mineral fertilizers market players following the publication of an article in one of periodicals, charging it with a failure to comply with environmental and tax laws, the joint-stock companies law, the industrial safety laws as well as on other violations at the Plaintiff’s facilities. 

On November 1, 2012 Moscow Arbitrazh Court found the information published to be untrue and discrediting for the Plaintiff, compelling the Respondent to publish a rebuttal article and recovered 900,000 rubles from the Respondents in reputation damages.

EPAM Team, including Partner Valery Eremenko, Senior Associate Alina Kudriavtseva, and Associate Denis Golubev,  managed to defend the publishing house, convincing the Ninth Arbitrazh Appellate Court to set aside the trial court judgment.

“As higher courts very rarely review decisions in disputes of this type, this is clearly a telling case for the practice, which makes its success even more valuable”, says Alina Kudriavtseva, Senior Associate at EPAM.

“The reversal of this decision will make it possible to keep away from the dangerous trend of infringing on journalists’ rights to openly express their opinions on environment protection and industrial safety issues that undoubtedly attract public attention. As per the practice of the European Court for Human Rights, journalists and mass media whose main purpose is to cover pressing and controversial and express criticism to stir public interest are granted extra legal remedies”, adds Alina Kudriavtseva.