June 30 (SeeNews) - Bulgarian competition regulator said it has rejected a complaint by MAK/ADMAK, a tie-up of Kuwaiti Abdulmohsin Al-Kharafi & Sons (MAK) and United Arab Emirates' Admak General Contracting Company (ADMAK), against the concession of Sofia Airport.
The tie-up, which built a new runway at Sofia airport in 2006, requested last month that the concession tender be called off as it could the payout of a $45 million (40.55 million euro) fine the tie-up stands to receive from the airport.
In 2012, the International Court of Arbitration in Paris ruled that the Sofia Airport has to the fine to the Kuwaiti consortium that built its new runaway for failing to provide timely access to the construction site. Bulgaria awarded the 53 million euro runway project to the consortium in 2002.
The decision of the Commission for the Protection of Competition can be appealed, it said in a notice published on its website earlier this week.
Earlier this month, Bulgaria's transport ministry launched a 35-year tender for the concession of Sofia Airport seeking at least 550 million levs ($313.6 million/281.4 million euro) in a one-off concession payment.
(1 euro = 1.95583 levs)