By: streiff (Diary) From RedState

The court filings in Alexandria stem from an agreement in March, 2007 to create a Cayman Islands partnership, Pericles Emerging Market Investors L.P, between a firm owned by Manafort and Gates and Surf Horizon Ltd., described as a company incorporated that summer in Cyprus to serve as a special purpose vehicle for investments by one of Deripaska’s companies in Moscow. (Deripaska is not identified by name in the court filings, but sources directly familiar with the case told Yahoo News he was the principal figure with whom Manafort had partnered.)

The partnership’s purpose was to “generate significant long term capital appreciation” through private equity investments in Ukraine, Russia and elsewhere. As part of the deal, Deripaska’s firms paid $7.35 million in management fees to Manafort and Gates.

But the deal went south after Pericles paid $18.9 million in 2008 to holdings in Cyprus controlled by Manafort and Gates for the purchase of Black Sea Cable, a Ukrainian holding company for telecommunications and Internet interests in that country. Citing the worldwide financial crisis that year, Deripaska’s firms later suspended further investments and the two parties agreed to wind down their partnership, according to the filing by Deripaska’s lawyers.

Lawyers for the Russian oligarch then started seeking information–and audits–about what happened to the investment and the management fees Deripaska’s firms had paid. In court papers, they allege they discovered that the Ukranian investment had been structured differently then they had been led to believe – with different partners. When they sought obtain copies of the agreement and sales contracts–as well as promised audit reports on their investment–Manafort and Gates did not respond to their requests. Deripaska’s lawyers then sought and obtained the appointment of court appointed liquidators to investigate what happened to his money.