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AFK Sistema turns to courts to uphold Kyrgyz cell phone rights

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MOSCOW, July 5 (RIA Novosti) - AFK Sistema (RTS: AFKS, LSE: SSA) said Wednesday it intends to seek a court ruling to uphold its ownership rights to Kyrgyz mobile phone operator Bitel.

Mobile operator MTS, owned by AFK Sistema, completed a deal to acquire a 51% controlling stake in Tarino Limited for $150 million in December 2005. In turn, Tarino Limited purchased three offshore companies that claimed rights to Bitel.

MTS concluded the deal through its Luxembourg-based subsidiary, Mobile TeleSystems Finance S.A.

But another company, Reservspetsmet, said it had struck a deal to purchase Bitel from Fellowes, controlled by the telecom arm of Russia's Alfa Group, in May 2005.

In December 2005, the Supreme Court of Kyrgyzstan passed a ruling on denying MTS its rights to a controlling stake in Bitel.

Bitel is the republic's sole company operating on the GSM (Global System for Mobile Communications) standard. The company controls 87% of the Kyrgyz cell phone market and has about 470,000 subscribers.

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