Alisher Usmanov, the Russian billionaire who owns 31.1 percent of Megafon, is trying to prevent TeliaSonera and Alfa Group from merging their holdings in Megafon, The Financial Times reports. Alfa, the Russian conglomerate, agreed a deal with TeliaSonera last November to pool their stakes in Megafon and the Turkish mobile operator Turkcell. The alliance would give them joint control of Russia's third-largest mobile operator Megafon. While the two companies had invited Usmanov to join the proposed joint venture, Usmanov's telecoms investment vehicle Telekominvest said it had filed the lawsuit based on a law that has recently come into force in Russia, barring foreign investors from taking control of strategic companies, including those in the telecoms sector. Alfa's telecoms arm Altimo has argued the deal would not pose any breach of anti-monopoly or foreign investment laws because the ultimate breakdown of stakes in the company would remain the same even though Telia and Altimo would merge their holdings. TeliaSonera owns 35.6 percent of Megafon and Alfa holds a 25.1 percent stake. The Swedish group also has a 26 percent stake in Telekominvest, further complicating efforts to simplify the ownership structure. Altimo said it could not comment until it had seen a copy of the lawsuit, but does not see any breach of the law. TeliaSonera said it had not been notified of the lawsuit and stressed that its first priority was resolving an ownership dispute in Turkey before trying to set up the joint venture. Altimo's CEO Alexei Reznikovich has also said the two parties will not set up the joint venture until a series of lawsuits over the control of Turkcell have been heard. Hearings of the cases are not expected until the summer. A Russian government commission on foreign investment recently approved a similarly structured deal between Altimo and Telenor of Norway.
