It is the company that almost immediately upon its inception took control over the Chisinau International Airport, on lease agreement, in August 2013, for a period of 49 years. Since then, this company has changed several owners. In the latest move, in September 2016, a Cypriot company called Komaksavia Airport Invest LTD acquired 95% of equity in Avia Invest SRL - which operates the airport - from the Russian Komaksavia OOO. The Khabarovsk Airport kept the remaining 5% of share.
Avia Invest SRL has attracted public attention all the time.
The concession agreement has been reviewed by governmental agencies, parliamentary commissions, and the Auditors Court. In 2015, for example, the cabinet of Chiril Gaburici and later the cabinet of Valeriu Strelet pushed for investigations into how the country’s main airport had been seized by almost incognito entities. More recently the cabinet led by Ion Chicu has called for terminating the agreement with Avia Invest, following recommendations from the National Anticorruption Center (CNA). The latter resumed in a memo that the airport was not being modernized from the investor’s promised resources but from the revenues from ticket sales - in clear violation of the agreement. In addition, a part of the money landed in accounts of Ilan Sor’s companies.
In the summer of 2019, this case was dealt with by a parliamentary commission that reviewed a number of suspicious past privatizations and concessions made. In conclusion, it filed a request with the Prosecutor-General's Office to look into the Avia Invest matter.
In autumn 2019 throughout autumn 2020, a series of court hearings debated whether the state should take back the airport, citing the lessor’s failure to comply with the conditions and its own investment plan. In response, in mid-May 2020, Komaksavia Airport Invest, which controls Avia Invest, filed a complaint against Moldova at the International Arbitration Court in Stockholm, seeking reparations for damages amounting to 900 million euro.
On the other side, on 8 July 2020, the Public Property Agency (APP) issued a resolution recommending the state to call off the agreement regarding the management of the assets of the state-owned enterprise Chisinau International Airport including the adjacent land. Avia Invest was told to return all the assets to the airport.
On 2 August 2020, the Arbitration Institute of the Stockholm Chamber of Commerce recommended to the Moldovan Government to refrain from the enforcement APP’s resolution, issuing a 180-day notice that put it on hold until a permanent measure is found.
