Ex-Premier Vlad Filat said the concession of the Chisinau International Airport was a necessary step and this wasn’t designed to lead to what it led and the problem was and remains who and in what conditions conceded the airport. According to the former Prime Minister, Ilan Shor was an interface in this case, whereas Vlad Plahotniuc has been the main beneficiary of the scheme from the start, IPN reports.

“Reference was often made to the decision taken by the Government led by me. The given decision offered only the general framework concerning the concession. That contest was later held. The fact that they say the “beneficiary” was “Magadanskii” or someone else is simply impudence, from my viewpoint. I didn’t know about this. I understood a serious investor would come,” Vlad Fila stated in the second part of his first prison interview broadcast by TV8 channel on July 15.

The former Premier said the airport couldn’t have been promised to Shor as Plahotniuc wouldn’t have made presents in this case.

According to him, when the necessity of conceding the airport was discussed, they started from the idea that investments of over €200 million was needed and the state didn’t have such money. An airport that would cope with the rise in the number of passengers was needed given also the liberalization of the visa regime with the EU.

Vlad Filat said the airport would have been a profitable company if a business plan that would have ensured profitability in the future had existed. He noted that in the speech he gave in Parliament on October 15, 2015, when he was arrested, he made reference to the airport. “In the case of the airport, as in the case of the Savings Bank, we were made promises that a company would enter at the initial stage and a very large Europeans investor would come later,” he stated.

In 2013, the Russian limited liability company “Avia Invest” took over the Chisinau International Airport for a period of 49 years and Ilan Shor was named president of the company’s Administration Board.