The Moscow city government is planning to file a retaliatory court case against the owner of a recently demolished kiosk near the Yuzhnaya metro station in southern Moscow, the RBC news agency reported Tuesday.
The owner of the Sozidanie kiosk filed a 1.8 million ruble ($27,720) suit against the city government in the Moscow Arbitration Court on May 31, after the property was demolished on Feb. 9 during the so-called “Night of the Long Shovels.”
The planned counter-suit is estimated to be for at least 10 million rubles ($154,000) and includes several claims against the alleged profit that Sozidanie’s owner gained from the unauthorized use of land, RBC reported. According to the head of the capital’s real estate inspectorate, Sergei Shogurov, Sozidanie’s lease for a temporary not-for-profit property expired in 2012.
The kiosk was demolished, along with more than 100 other kiosks and pavilions, in February. Officials claimed that all such retail structures were illegally occupying land and that the owners had been informed of the deadline a month beforehand. Many owners, however, have since denied such claims, saying that such warnings were never given.
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