The bank accounts of Tajik Air (7J, Dushanbe) have been seized in an effort to recover USD20 million demanded by Lithuanian company Skyroad Leasing, the latest development in a long-running legal dispute.

Sharif Nurzoda, a senior official with the Tajik government’s Enforcement Service, told reporters that the agency was acting in line with a Supreme Economic Court of Tajikistan decision from July 2021, which upheld a Vilnius arbitration court ruling in 2019 against the cash-strapped flag carrier.

“As part of the implementation of the decision of the Supreme Economic Court, all of the airline’s accounts were arrested,” Nurzoda said on July 20, as quoted by Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty’s Tajik service, known locally as Radio Ozodi.

However, as the official admitted, the airline simply lacks the funds and owes a significant amount in taxes and other payments.

“The first thing the national air carrier has to do is pay off the wage arrears of its employees and its debts to the Tax Committee, but the airline has no money. It was because of the lack of funds that the execution of the claim of the Lithuanian company was postponed several times,” he said.

The airline has not commented on the development but claimed last summer that it had already paid USD15 million and did not intend to pay the full sum the lessor was demanding. Complicating the issue, in January 2021 the Federal Court of the US District of Columbia granted a request from the carrier and refused to recognise or enforce the arbitration award.

Part of Lithuania’s Avia Solutions Group, Skyroad Leasing was known as AviaAM B03 until 2014 and is now headquartered in Cyprus as AviaAM Leasing. It dry-leased two Boeing aircraft to Tajik Air from 2009, but in 2013 the companies clashed over outstanding payments and interest.

According to the ch-aviation fleets module, Tajik Air currently operates a fleet of five aircraft, all of which are inactive. One of these, B757-200 EY-751 (msn 24964), is leased from AviaAM and is stored at Dushanbe. The other aircraft, B737-400 EY-753 (msn 25736), is stored at Sharjah and was re-registered last month as N7378C.

The other three jets in the fleet, all of which are owned, are one B737-300, one B767-300, and one MA-60. A court in Russia considered Skyroad Leasing’s claim and in 2019 seized the B737-300, EY-444 (msn 26441). It remains stored at Moscow Vnukovo.