Podgorica, (MINA-BUSINESS) – The Appellate Court of Appeals has rejected the parties’ appeals and upheld the ruling of the Commercial Court from mid-November last year in the case brought by the bankrupt Slovenian company Primorje against Monteput.

“In this way, the court proceedings, which lasted more than one and a half decades at first instance, have been finally concluded. The case pertained to a claim for damages arising from the contract for works on the reconstruction of the Kolasin–Matesevo road dated 14 October2005,” the Court said in a press release.

The Commercial Court partially upheld the plaintiff’s claim, ordering Monteput to pay €54,650 in compensation for damages under the contract, while dismissing as unfounded the remainder of the claim in which the plaintiff sought an additional €1.6 million.

The Appellate Court found that both appeals were unfounded. According to the press release, based on extensive evidence and expert reports, the first-instance court correctly determined that the reconstruction works on the Kolasin–Matesevo road were completed 190 days after the contractual deadline, and that both contracting parties were responsible for the delay. 

“With regard to the works on the Djurasevic Bridge, the first-instance court established that the deadline was extended by about 35 days due to the investor’s failure to fulfil contractual obligations,” the press release reads.

In assessing the justification of the costs incurred by the plaintiff as a result, the first-instance court correctly concluded that the plaintiff is entitled to actual costs which, as determined by a construction expert assessment, include site overhead costs, costs arising from the underutilization of planned machinery capacity, and costs caused by unresolved property and legal issues during the handover of the route, in the total amount of €54,650, while the remaining part of the claim was properly rejected as unfounded.