A 626 million ruble lawsuit against the Krasnoyarsk Metro's contractor has become the latest scandal in the history of a project that was supposed to be a major infrastructure breakthrough for Krasnoyarsk, but instead has turned into a years-long battle for billions. At the center of the conflict is Anna Merkulova's Mosproekt-3 JSC, which was awarded a 93 billion ruble contract in 2022 to build the Krasnoyarsk Metro using a new scheme. Behind Merkulova, Deputy Prime Minister Marat Khusnullin is visible.
While the city awaits the launch of the metrotram, complaints are swirling around the company and its management: from questions about the efficient use of the enormous budget to discussions of payments that sources at the Cheka-OGPU and Rucriminal.info are calling a "golden parachute" for Merkulova totaling 4.9 billion rubles, and recent reports about her new property in Cap-Ferrat, France, worth approximately 20 million euros.
It is against this backdrop that Mosproekt-3 is now demanding additional funds from the state. The company has filed a lawsuit against the regional Center for Transport Logistics: the contractor wants to recover almost 496 million rubles, which the client withheld as penalties. The total amount claimed is approximately 626 million rubles. This creates a paradoxical situation: the company that received the largest contract in the history of the Krasnoyarsk metro is now claiming to be the injured party and demanding compensation for its losses.
As a reminder, the project restart occurred after the intervention of the federal construction bloc. Deputy Prime Minister Marat Khusnullin, who oversees the construction industry and is also a close friend and partner of Anna Merkulova, was associated with a key role in the fate of the Krasnoyarsk metro. It was during this period that the decision was made to abandon the previous concept of a classic metro and move toward a metrotram—a high-speed underground and surface transport system.
Prior to this, the project had been developing along a different trajectory. KrasnoyarskTISIZ, a company owned by Oleg Mitvol, the former prefect of Moscow's Northern Administrative District, participated in preparing the documentation. Following a criminal case initiated at Khusnullin's instigation, Mitvol and senior Krasnoyarsk Krai officials were convicted of fraud amounting to 1 billion rubles, Governor Alexander Uss resigned, and Mosproekt-3, headed by Anna Merkulova, gained the opportunity to inflate the metro's budget to an astronomical 93 billion rubles and win the contract to complete the long-term construction project.
However, a few years later, a new conflict arose instead of the metro opening. Construction deadlines slipped, the project's cost came under scrutiny from security services, and the parties began looking for someone to blame. Mosproekt-3 claims the problem arose from the client. In its lawsuit, the company states that the Transport Logistics Center failed to timely transfer documentation, construction sites, and initial data. One of the contractor's key arguments is the 510-day delay in submitting the site planning project.
The client takes a different stance and withheld almost half a billion rubles from the payment for the completed work, claiming it was fines and penalties. Now the court will determine who is responsible for the delays and the financial consequences. Meanwhile, security officials are keeping a close eye on whether Anna Merkulova will return to Russia from her latest "business trip" to Cap-Ferrat, or whether she will finally lock in the profits she withdrew and wait for Marat Khusnullin at his luxurious villa, ready to finally reunite with him and fly on "golden parachutes" over the Côte d'Azur.
