Russia's Skolkovo innovation hub may soon face problems because its influential neighbors, including tycoon Roman Abramovich, do not intend to share land with it, the Vedomosti daily said on Tuesday.
The research hub requires some 600 hectares of land in total. President Dmitry Medvedev has already ordered that the 375 hectares necessary before construction can begin be allotted to Skolkovo by the end of the year.
Skolkovo is being built from scratch 20 km (12.4 miles) outside of Moscow. The center will focus on research in five priority spheres: energy, information technologies, communication, biomedical research and nuclear technologies.
However, much of the territory that the Kremlin would like to use for the realization of its pet project is owned neither by the state, nor by state entities, the paper said.
A substantial part of the land in question belongs to the Gloria company, owned by Abramovich. A golf course is currently being constructed on the land and there are no plans to involve it in Skolkovo's development project, said John Mann, a representative of the London-based Millhouse Company which manages Abramovich's assets.
Another 15.4 hectares are owned by the Zarechenshkiye Dachi Company which is believed to be a part of Zarechye Development, which belongs to Olga Shuvalova, wife of First Deputy Premier Igor Shuvalov and another businessman, Vedomosti reported.
"Zarachenskiye Dachi are implementing their own project on the territory and are not considering any proposals from Skolkovo," Zarechye Developmnt's CEO Yekaterina Muratidis said. She refused to comment further.
Owners of the other neighboring parcels of land have heard nothing about plans to expand Skolkovo's territory, the paper said.
The land will only be able to taken away from its current owners if a special federal law is adopted, lawyer Ilya Sviridov said, commenting on the situation for Vedomosti.
MOSCOW, July 6 (RIA Novosti)
