AIIB may not start operations in 2015 - Russia’s Deputy Finance Minister

BEIJING, June 29. /TASS/. Contrary to forecasts of the Chinese side, the Asian Infrastructure Development Bank (AIIB) may not be in time to start operations in 2015, Russian Deputy Finance Minister Sergey Storchak told TASS on Monday after the signing ceremony of the bank’s establishment. "Project initiators, the Chinese party, confidently state the bank will launch operations by the end of this year but this is a highly ambitious task in my opinion, especially considering that ratification procedures took approximately a year relatively to BRICS Bank. Furthermore, there are just five nations there while we have 57 founding states here," Storchak said. "The Bank has not yet been created yet; articles of its establishment were only signed today. It means the process of agreement ratification starts. The institution may start practical work after ratification procedures are completed in at least ten countries holding no less than 50% of bank’s equity," the deputy minister said. Russia signed today the agreement on the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank and received 65,362 shares in the bank and 5.92% of votes in the Bank. It becomes the third largest founder in terms of votes and shares after China and India, which hold 26.06% and 7.5% of votes accordingly. AIIB will be headquartered in Beijing. The financial institute will start operations already by the end of this year. Read more