Russia's Altimo has proposed a swift settlement to Norway's Telenor over a legal dispute preventing VimpelCom telecoms firm, which they own jointly, from taking over Egypt's Orascom and Italy's Wind, Altimo said late on Thursday.
Altimo, the telecoms arm of Russian billionaire Mikhail Fridman's Alfa-Group, is pushing ahead with a cash-and-share merger between VimpelCom and Wind Telecom, which belongs to Egyptian tycoon Naguib Sawiris, but Telenor fears that a new share issue will dilute its stake in VimpelCom to 25% from 36.03% as it cannot exercise preemptive rights.
Altimo's stake will be diluted to 31% from 44.65%.
In January, Telenor filed a suit in the Commercial Court of London to prove it had preemptive rights and asked the court to put an injunction on VimpelCom shares before a court decision is taken.
Altimo said in a statement that it and VimpelCom had proposed solving the issue before March 7 using accelerated legal proceedings.
A source close to VimpelCom shareholders told RIA Novosti that Altimo had promised Telenor that it would not use VimpelCom shares for mergers and acquisitions that could dilute Telenor's holding if it withdrew its injunction request . Altimo also promised an extraordinary shareholders' meeting to vote on issuing more shares for Telenor if it rejected the injunction.
Fridman has said he dreamed of creating a global telecoms operator.
But Telenor said it was not going to scrap the injunctions measures in its suit.
"We believe that Altimo's proposal is not consistent with VimpelCom's shareholders' agreement, it cannot be guaranteed and does not protect Telenor's interests as VimpelCom's shareholder," Telenor spokeswoman Anna Ivanova-Galitsyna said.
"This is why Telenor will continue protecting its rights in the Commercial Court of London and in the Arbitration court."
VimpelCom will hold a shareholders' meeting on March 17, where minority shareholders will decide on the fate of the deal.
MOSCOW, February 11 (RIA Novosti)
