Potash dispute threatens to become diplomatic row
Print Edition
Russia yesterday demanded the release of the head of Russian company Uralkali, whose arrest in Belarus threatens to turn a business dispute that shook the US$20-billion global potash market into a diplomatic row.
Vladislav Baumgertner, chief executive of the world’s largest potash producer, was detained on Monday at the airport of Belarusian capital Minsk.
Baumgertner had been invited to secret talks with Prime Minister Mikhail Myasnikovich.
Footage released by the Belarusian Investigative Committee showed Baumgertner being searched, his legs spread and hands against a wall.
President Alexander Lukashenko appears to have taken it as a personal affront when Uralkali quit a cartel last month with a Belarusian state firm producing potash, a fertiliser ingredient.
The main owner of Uralkali, which controls 20 percent of the world market, is Suleiman Kerimov, a billionaire with close ties to President Vladimir Putin’s Kremlin administration.
Russia’s Foreign Ministry summoned the Belarusian ambassador to issue a rebuke, warning of unspecified consequences for bilateral ties.
“It is impermissible to detain a person on his way home after he came for talks at the invitation of the Belarusian government,” Deputy Foreign Minister Grigory Karasin told news agency Interfax.
Russia’s ambassador to Minsk yesterday asked prosecutors afternoon to release Baumgertner. Officials said they would review the case, but stressed they were dealing with a crime that had inflicted severe economic damage on Belarus.
Baumgertner, who faces up to 10 years in jail on charges of abusing his powers, could in effect be ransomed by Belarus in return for concessions by Russia, analysts speculated.
Uralkali Chairman Alexander Voloshin said he was outraged and that the charges “simply look clumsy.”
The market for potash has long been dominated by a handful of players led by the Belarusian Potash Co (BPC), a marketing venture between Uralkali and state-owned Belaruskali.
Angered by a law passed in Belarus last year allowing Belaruskali to sell outside the venture, Uralkali quit the cartel, warning prices could fall by 25 percent this year.
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