Court: Ukraine can try to avoid repaying $3B loan to Russia

By BRIAN MELLEY
Associated Press

LONDON (AP) — The U.K. Supreme Court has ruled that Ukraine can try to avoid repaying $3 billion in loans it said it took under pressure from Russia in 2013 to prevent it from trying to join the European Union. The court on Wednesday rejected a bid by a British company acting on Russia’s behalf to order Ukraine to repay the loans without facing a trial. Ukraine said it borrowed the money while facing the threat of military force and massive illegal economic and political pressure nearly a decade before Russia invaded its neighbor. The loans were issued before Russia illegally annexed Ukraine’s Crimea peninsula in 2014, and the case was heard before Russia invaded Ukraine last year.