Fight on cartels: national experience and international cooperation

At a session of the Interstate Council on Antimonopoly Policy, the NP “Assistance to Competition Development” suggested conducting a series of seminars dedicated to the investigation of cartels. The first on-line seminar “Investigation of cartels in Belarus and Russia: the basics”, with the support from the FAS of Russia and the Association of Corporate Lawyers, was held on June 19 of 2013. Konstantin Aleshin, Deputy Chief of the Department on Cartel Fight of the FAS of Russia, Vasiliy Rudomino (moderator of the seminar), Chairman of the NP “Assistance to Competition Development”, Arthur Rokhlin, Partner of the Law Firm "YUST", Advocate Tatiana Ignatovskaya, Member of the Council of the NP “Assistance to Competition Development in the CIS Countries”, and Dmitry Rozhkov, Member of the General Council of the NP “Assistance to Competition Development”, former Executive Director of the NP, took part in the event.

During the event, the participants focused on the most acute questions of proving cartels, cartel’s difference from agreements and concerted actions, of description of the market during administrative proceedings as well as the latest changes to the antimonopoly legislation of Belarus and examples of regulation of associations of economic activity elements. The experts criticized the Russian court practice, which significantly influences the actions of the civil turnover parties.

The following seminars will be dedicated to the peculiarities of cartel investigation in other CIS jurisdictions, in particular – Ukraine, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Uzbekistan etc., as well as to special issues: collection of evidence, standards of proving, defense strategies and interaction with expert economists, functioning of the program of exemption from liability etc.

The materials of the seminar will be available soon at the websites of the NP “Assistance to Competition Development”, the FAS of Russia and the Association of Corporate Lawyers.

See here [PDF] the presentation of the speech “Main practical problems of cartel investigation” by Arthur Rokhlin, Partner of the Law Firm "YUST".