FAS AND ROSFINMONITORING SIGNED A PROTOCOL TO AN AGREEMENT ON INFORMATION INTERACTION
The Protocol is signed under the frame of large-scale efforts on exposing and suppressing cartels and other anticompetitive agreements in order to expand such efforts in the regions
On 17 August 2018, the Federal Antimonopoly Service and the Federal Financial Monitoring Service signed an Additional Protocol to the Agreement on Information Interaction on exposing cartels and other forms of collusion concluded between the agencies in 2011.
Under the Agreement, FAS and Rosfinmonitoring exchange information to efficiently combat cartels. The work is especially successful in the budget areas – in the course of public procurement and procurement by state-run companies.
For instance, due to joint investigations in 2016 – H1 2018 FAS and its regional Offices opened 22 antimonopoly cases and made 15 decisions on violating the antimonopoly law.
The cases mostly concerned supplies of pharmaceuticals and medical products, construction, food products for social and educational facilities. The administrat5ive fines upon cartel members reached around 1 billion RUB.
“Singing the Additional Protocol to the Agreement on Information Interaction opens new opportunities for prompt interaction between FAS regional Offices and Rosfinmonitoringregional Offices. The information will not flow any longer through the Central Offices of the agencies but our regional Offices will be able to communicate directly”, explained Stats-Secretary, Deputy Head of FAS Andrey Tsarikovskiy who supervises anti-cartel work at FAS.
Rosfinmonitoring Deputy Director Oleg Krylov pointed out that “regional Offices of FAS and Rosfinmonitoring will be able to exchange information directly that will shorted the investigations considerably” and proposed to organize joint trainings of the staff of the regional Offices.
The parties discussed high-level efficiency of the existing inter-departmental cooperation and expressed hope for further productive interaction at the regional level.
Reference:
Examples of FAS decisions made based on the information supplied from Rosfinmonitoring:
1.
“Pharm SKD” Ltd. and “Novopharm” Ltd. violated Clause 2 Part 1 Article 11 of the Federal Law “On Protection of Competition” by concluding and implementing an anticompetitive agreement to maintain prices at 465 e-auctions for supplies of medicines for the needs of medical facilities in Russia in total for over 420 million RUB.
The members of the large cartel are held administratively liable for over 90 million RUB.
The case materials are forwarded to the Chief Department of Economic Security and Anti-Corruption of the Ministry of Interior for pre-investigation verification and opening a criminal case upon an offence under Part 2 Article 178 of the Criminal Code.
2.
90 economic entities violated Clause 2 Part 1 Article 11 of the Federal Law “On Protection of Competition”, by concluding and implementing a cartel at 18 open e-auctions for supplies of вещевого имущества for the needs of the Federal Customs Service, the Ministry of Interior and the Federal Security Service in total for 3.5 billion RUB.
The members of the large cartel are held administratively liable for over 600 million RUB.
The case materials are forwarded to the Chief Department of Economic Security and Anti-Corruption of the Ministry of Interior for pre-investigation verification and opening a criminal case upon an offence under Part 2 Article 178 of the Criminal Code.