MOSCOW (Press release) – Mobile TeleSystems OJSC, telecommunications provider in Russia and the CIS, announces that, having received licenses and obtained legal and technical conditions for operations in the country, it is resuming operations in Turkmenistan.

On July 25, 2012, MTS, its wholly owned subsidiary BCTI, the Communications Ministry of Turkmenistan, state-owned operators Altyn Asyr and TurkmenTelecom signed a settlement agreement pursuant to which the parties undertake to withdraw all mutual legal claims relevant to the cessation of MTS’s activities in Turkmenistan in December 2010. Subsequently, MTS and the state-owned provider of telecommunications services, State Enterprise for Electrocommunications TurkmenTelecom, acting in accordance with a decree issued by the President of Turkmenistan, signed an Agreement stipulating the terms and conditions for the operation of MTS’s wholly owned subsidiary MTS-TURKMENISTAN. This agreement was signed for a period of five years and may be extended for another five year term subject to fulfilment of certain conditions. It stipulates that MTS-TURKMENISTAN will on a monthly basis pay to TurkmenTelecom 30% of its net profit derived from operations in Turkmenistan. The amount of net profit is calculated based on the financial statements prepared in accordance with Turkmen accounting standards subject to certain adjustments.

MTS-TURKMENISTAN has been granted GSM and 3G licenses for a three-year term, has signed a number of interconnect and access to infrastructure agreements with Turkmenistan state-owned telecommunications providers and has been allocated other technical resources enabling it to resume operations throughout Turkmenistan.

MTS’ infrastructure remains fully in place and MTS-TURKMENISTAN is currently working with the vendors to restore network’s capacity and to quickly relaunch services to its subscriber base of more than 2.4 mln customers.