OREANDA-NEWS. September 30, 2010. With regards to UC RUSAL’s statement of claim forwarded to Krasnoyarsk Arbitration Court about invalidation of the decision adopted at the General Annual shareholders’ meeting of OJSC MMC Norilsk Nickel (“Norilsk Nickel” or “the Company”) we consider necessary to state the following, reported the press-centre of Norilsk Nickel.

The lack of desired support from the General Prosecutor and Russian Financial Services Authority (FSFR) pushed UC Rusal to use the last weapon in order to distract shareholders, investors and general public from the revealed inconsistencies in its own articles of association.

As it has already been mentioned, the AGM on June 28, 2010 was conducted in strict conformity with the applicable Russian legislation and internal documents of MMC Norilsk Nickel. The government inspectors have not found any grounds to deem the AGM results void. We would like to emphasize one more time that the current Board of Directors was duly elected and represents the interests of all shareholders of the Company.

The Company is considering this law suit as one of the steps in strategy of "corporate blackmailing" being implemented by UC Rusal and envisaged at destabilizing the operation of MMC Norilsk Nickel and suppression of its shareholder value.