Senior Partner of Volkov Koziakov and Partners Sergii Koziakov has participated in the Round Table "Protection of Economic Competition in Ukraine: Priorities and Prospects” held on August 30, 2010 at the press-center of Information Agency LIGABusinessInform.
At the arrangement there were present Chairman of the Antimonopoly Committee of Ukraine (the AMCU) Oleksiy Kostusiev, Deputy Chairman Svitlana Moroz, top managers of the leading law firms specialized in the Competition Law, and representatives of the business.
At the meeting the participants discussed the priorities of the Antimonopoly Committee’s activities and the AMCU’s initiatives in protection of economic competition in different commodity markets. The issue of possible changes in the Ukrainian competition legislation became the focal point of the discussion.

Volkov Koziakov and Partners represents the interests of Korea Electronics Association in the safeguard investigation concerning imports of refrigerating and freezing equipment regardless country of origin and export.
The investigation has been initiated based on Ukraine-based Nord Group Holding’s application.

According to the annual research conducted within the project “Law Firms of Ukraine” Senior Partner Sergii Koziakov and Managing Partner Oleksiy Volkov of Volkov Koziakov & Partners have been listed among 25 most outstanding lawyers of Ukraine.
The research was based on opinion poll of the leading players of Ukraine’s law market.

Senior Partner of Volkov Koziakov & Partners Sergii Koziakov has participated in the discussion of the draft decree of the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine on Measures for Public Participation in Formation and Implementation of National Policy. The Cabinet's Minister Anatoliy Tolstoukhov, representatives of the Ministry of Justice and public organizations have also taken part in the event that was held in the Cabinet's Club meeting hall on July 22.
Opening the meeting, Mr. Tolstoukhov stated that the objective of the offered draft decree is to determine key requirements to organisation and conduct by the executive bodies of public consultations regarding formation and implementation of the national policy and introduction of democratic procedure of formation of public councils within the central and local bodies of executive power. Mr. Tolstoukhov emphasized on the importance to enhance the nature of interaction between the authority and community, as in the nearest future the state needs to adopt a number of 'unpopular' decisions.
The public organizations' representatives have backed up the measures aimed at enhancement of the interaction, and, in turn, pointed to a range of rather essential, in their opinion, drawbacks of the draft decree, namely, unclearly outlined issues of status and nature of interaction between the public council and the authority, within the structure of which it is established.

On July 13, 2010, hearings between the interested parties in the course of safeguard investigation concerning the imports of ferroalloys to Ukraine regardless of country of origin and export took place.
In the course of the hearings Volkov Koziakov & Partners represented the largest Korean producer and exporter of ferroalloys Dongbu Metal Co., Ltd.
National producers and representatives of foreign producers of ferroalloys participated in the hearings conducted by the Department of Trade Defense Instruments of the Ministry of Economy of Ukraine. The mentioned safeguard investigation was initiated under the application of three largest Ukrainian producers of ferroalloys: OJSC “Nikopolskyi Ferroalloy Plant”, OJSC “Zaporizkyi Ferroalloy Plant” and OJSJ “Stakhanovskyi Ferroalloy Plant”.
On behalf of Volkov Koziakov & Partners senior partner Sergii Koziakov, counsel Viktoriia Kotsiubska and associates Anna Gladshtein and Andrii Zablotskyi took part in the hearings.

On July 13, 2010, the regular meeting of the Interdepartmental Commission on International Trade, responsible for adopting decisions on trade investigations, took place. For the first time representatives of foreign producers, against which trade investigations are initiated and conducted, were invited at such a collegial body’s session. Senior partner of Volkov Koziakov and Partners Sergii Koziakov and counsel Victoria Kotsiubska successfully represented the interests of Samsung Electronics, Co., Ltd.

Anatolii Chebukin, Senior Associate of Volkov Koziakov & Partners, took part in the round table devoted to the topic “Explicit and Implicit Hazards of the Ukrainian Energy Safety” and held on June 25, 2010 at LigaBusinessInform’s Press Center.
The top issue for discussion became the principal trends of development of the alternative energy and use of alternative restorable energy sources in Ukraine. Moreover, basic preferences in the tariff policy, taxation and customs control for entities of alternative energy were also covered. The participants placed a high emphasis on the role of legal counsels with regard to the process of investing into the energy sector.

Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv moot court team has an excellent record in ELSA Moot Court Competition on WTO Law, winning the Ukrainian National Rounds, making the semi-finals of the European Regional Round in Belgium and having an excellent performance and gaining unforgettable experience in Final Oral Round in the Dominican Republic. After completion of all regional rounds Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv team was the only one which won the right to represent Eastern Europe.
The participants of the Final Oral Rounds represented 16 leading world universities from Spain, Switzerland, India, USA, Australia, the Netherlands, UK, Columbia, Germany, Canada, Jamaica, Philippines. In Santo-Domingo, the Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv team faced off against team from the Duke Law School (USA) and also competed against the University of Melbourne, the top-ranked team after the preliminary rounds.
Counsel Volkov Koziakov and Partners Viktoriia Kotsiubska became a Coach of the team, while Senior Partner Sergii Koziakov trained the team as an Academic Advisor.
Besides, Volkov Koziakov and Partners provided the sponsor support of the team and also thank International Law Firm ‘Magisters’, Paritet Law Firm and ‘Bohdan Hawrylyshyn’ Charitable Foundation for financial support of the team. We also tender thanks to Daniil Fedorchuck, Boris Danevich, Nataliia Mescheriakova, Oleh Malskyy, Taras Kyslyy, Olga Romanenko and Oleg Riabokon for help in team’s preparation.

Volkov Koziakov & Partners gained the Best Ukrainian Law Firm award in competition law area. Mykola Podpalov, Partner of Volkov Koziakov & Partners, became the Best Ukrainian Lawyer in the area. This news come out on June 4 during the 4th annual ceremony of Law Awards 2010, one of the most prestigious awards in law established by the Yurydychna Praktyka law edition, the most affluent and highly regarded one in Ukraine.
This annual event is held to define leaders in different areas of the Ukrainian legal market. The winners are defined by the Nominating Commission, which consists of leading Ukrainian lawyers: academics, judges and legal practitioners.
The Nominating Commission made its decision to award Volkov Koziakov & Partners on the basis of the firm’s success unparalleled in competition law area. Lately, lawyers of the firm successfully represented interests of their clients in the Antimonopoly Committee of Ukraine, and got ahead in competition law litigations. It also worth mentioning, that most litigations involved lots of overwhelming odds and, were new for Ukraine in many respects.
Some of them worth special attention:

• One of the Volkov Koziakov and Partners’ challenging projects was representation of General Motors Company in the Antimonopoly Committee of Ukraine in the matter of obtaining a permit to acquire a part of Delphi Corporation’s key assets providing production of details for cars. The total amount of transaction exceeded USD 3,2 billions.
Our lawyers managed to obtain the permit for concentration within very tight period. Furthermore, Volkov, Koziakov & Partners appeared to be the only national firm to render service for the abovementioned transaction. In other jurisdictions General Motors Company was represented only by the largest international law firms. The project was managed by Sergii Koziakov and Mykola Podpalov, Partners, and Nataliia Isakhanova, Counsel.

• In early 2010, Volkov Koziakov & Partners has succeeded as a representative of OJSC Alfa-Bank (Russia) in the Antimonopoly Committee of Ukraine in obtaining permission to acquire a shareholding in PJSC Alfa-Bank (Ukraine), which is in Top 10 among the largest Ukrainian banks. The total amount of transaction was about hundreds million US dollars. The project was managed by partners Sergii Koziakov and Mykola Podpalov of Volkov Koziakov and Partners.

• In March 2010 the lawyers of Volkov Koziakov&Partners successfully represented Agricultural Limited Liability Company “Nibulon” (Mykolayiv, Ukraine) (the largest agricultural producer of Ukraine, leading exporters of grains and oilseeds) in the Antimonopoly Committee of Ukraine in the case involving anticompetitive actions of the Ministry of Transport and Communications of Ukraine that failed to permit Nibulon to perform its dredging works. Since 2004 the Ministry of Transport and Communications of Ukraine had not permitted Nibulon to perform dredging works in the inland waterway leased fields nearby the water area of the State Enterprise “Mykolayiv Commercial Sea Port”. The actual depth of the operating water area did not allow Nibulon to accept and efficiently load large-capacity cargo vessels at its grain transhipping terminal in Mykolayiv, while the port itself, as well as the other peers engaged in cargo transhipment enjoyed all the advantages of deeper water areas vested to them. The AMCU’s decision has given Nibulon the green light to perform dredging works for acceptance of large-capacity cargo vessels. Therefore, the anticompetitive conditions for business entities engaged in grains and oilseeds transhipment have been eliminated.
The project has been managed by Partners Mykola Podpalov, Oleksiy Volkov and Sergii Koziakov.

• Among investigations of the Antimonopoly Committee of Ukraine, in which the lawyers of Volkov Koziakov&Partners have participated, there is one involving the representation of the Association of Organizations of Medical and Microbiological Industry Employers of Ukraine in the case on violation of the Law on Protection Against Unfair Competition by Boehringer Ingelheim PCV Gmbh & Co KG (Vienna, Austria) that disseminated misleading information on Lazolvan pharmaceutical product.
The investigation revealed that Lazolvan advertisement contained inaccurate information on its pharmaceutical characteristics that misled consumers. Therefore, the Committee fined Boehringer Ingelheim PCV Gmbh & Co KG.
This case has become one of the most celebrated ever in the history where the Antimonopoly Committee of Ukraine punished a producer for dissemination of unfair advertising.
On the part of Volkov Koziakov&Partners the project was managed by Partners Mykola Podpalov, Sergii Koziakov and Oleksiy Volkov and assisted by Counsel Nataliia Isakhanova.

• Another project related to the participation in the Antimonopoly Committee investigation was the representation of one of the largest Ukrainian producers of pharmaceuticals - OJSC “Farmak”.
The company applied to the AMCU with the claim for the dissemination by pharmaceutical company Sanofi-Aventis of misleading information regarding certain medicine produced by OJSC “Farmak”. Based on the investigation findings the AMCU decided to recognize the Sanofi-Aventis’s actions as a violation of the Law On Protection Against Unfair Competition and fined the company.
The project was managed by Partners of Volkov Koziakov & Partners - Sergii Koziakov and Mykola Podpalov.

On May 28, 2010 the conference “Regional Trade Agreements: Fragmentation of International Trade Law” took place in the premises of the Dominican Republic’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Volkov Koziakov and Partners’ Counsel Viktoriia Kotsiubska participated in the conference which finalized the half-yearly research of the scholars and Elsa Moot Court on WTO Law participants on this subject. Ms. Kotsiubska delivered a speech on Regional Trade Agreements between CIS members and perspectives of free trade area between Ukraine and EU. Among other participants of the conference are such well-known scholars as Ms. Laura Nielsen (University of Copenhagen), Hannes Schloemann (WTI Advisors), Viktoria Donaldson (WTO Secretariat), Yasuhei Taniguchi (former WTO AB Member), Christian Häberli (World Trade Institute).