FACTBOX-Telenor's legal battles in Russia and Ukraine

May 19 (Reuters) - Norway's Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg
is expected to discuss telecom Telenor's (TEL.OL) troubled
Russian venture with Prime Minister Vladimir Putin and President
Dmitry Medvedev when he visits Moscow on Tuesday.

The Norwegian firm's operations in Russia and Ukraine are
mired in lawsuits, putting its investment in Russia's No. 2
mobile operator Vimpelcom (VIP.N) at risk and preventing it from
consolidating its majority-owned Ukrainian mobile venture
Kyivstar. [ID:nLI321564]

Below are details of Telenor's legal battles:

VIMPELCOM CASE

Vimpelcom's ownership structure: Telenor (29.9 percent
voting stock/33.6 percent common); Alfa Group (44.0/37.0);
Farimex (0.002 percent, when it filed a suit against Telenor)

* British Virgin Islands-registered Farimex sued Telenor in
a Siberian court, claiming the Norwegian company's opposition to
Vimpelcom's purchase of Ukrainian mobile operator Ukrainian
Radio Systems (URS) delayed the deal at a loss to Vimpelcom.

* Telenor says it opposed the 2005 purchase because URS was
overvalued, lacked prospects and the deal was not transparent.

* Vimpelcom's entry into Ukraine put it in direct
competition with Kyivstar, majority-owned by Telenor.

* A court in Khanty-Mansiysk, Siberia held Telenor liable
for $2.8 billion in August 2008, but an appeals court overturned
that decision. After a retrial in February, a court in Omsk,
Siberia, ruled in Farimex's favour and ordered Telenor to pay
Vimpelcom $1.7 billion.

* Telenor refused and the court seized its Vimpelcom shares.
Telenor fears the court will auction off the stake before its
appeal is heard on May 26.

* Telenor disputes Farimex's ability to claim the damages
given its small shareholding in Vimpelcom and believes Farimex
is linked to Vimpelcom co-owner Alfa Group, with which Telenor
has had a long history of litigation. Alfa denies it is linked
to Farimex.

* Vimpelcom has not expressed any interest in claiming the
fine but Telenor fears the court could force through the claim.

* Telenor has filed an injunction with a Moscow court to
prevent the sale of the stake while it appeals the fine, and the
hearing on that is due on June 3.

KYIVSTAR CASE

Kyivstar is Ukraine's largest mobile operator. Its
shareholders are: Telenor (56.52 percent); Alfa's subsidiary
Storm (43.48 percent)

* Telenor was forced to deconsolidate Kyivstar in 2007 due
to having "insufficient control" over the company. Storm has not
shown up to shareholder meetings for most of the past four
years.

* Storm boycotted the Kyivstar meetings because of a
Ukrainian court injunction against attending, which was
triggered by a case brought by EC Venture, a Swiss company that
sold its interest in Storm in 2004 and later sued Storm.

* Another Alfa Group company, telecoms arm Altimo, accused
Telenor of trying to gain control of Altimo's foreign assets.

* In March 2009, the U.S. Federal Court for the Southern
District of New York granted a Telenor motion for four Alfa
Group companies be held in contempt of court for failing to obey
U.S. arbitration court orders.

* The U.S. court concluded the EC Venture-Storm case was
friendly collusive litigation, a claim rejected by Alfa Group,
which maintains it has no control over EC Venture.

* The court ordered Alfa to pay fines, secure the dismissal
of EC Venture's litigation in Ukraine and reduce to a maximum of
5 percent its holdings in Kyivstar and in Kyivstar competitors
such as Turkcell (TCELL.IS) and Ukrainian High Technologies.

* Late last month, the U.S. court lifted the fines, saying
Altimo had complied with its ruling.

* On Monday, Telenor said it and Kyivstar were subject to
anti-monopoly investigation in Ukraine triggered by a complaint
from Farimex.

(Compiled by Wojciech Moskwa and John Acher in Oslo and
Maria Kiselyova in Moscow; editing by John Stonestreet)