War In Ukraine: Leroy Merlin Is Staying In Russia And Explains Why – The HuffPost

Google Maps screenshotA Leroy Merlin store in Moscow, Russia. UKRAINE – Staying, for now. Adeo, the holding company of Leroy Merlin which Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky asked on Wednesday March 23, among other companies, to leave Russia, replied that a closure would be considered a “premeditated bankruptcy”. to AFP, Adeo, on the other hand, claims to have “decided at the start of the conflict to suspend new investments” in Russia, where the group claims to have 45,000 employees for around a hundred stores. Volodymyr Zelensky urged this Wednesday before the French Parliament the French companies established in Russia to stop supporting the Russian “war machine” and to leave this country, also citing Renault and Auchan, a brand owned like Leroy Merlin by the Mulliez family. “A premeditated bankruptcy” “The decision to maintain our activity in Russia is a decision that is not easy”, replies Adeo, who says he has an “employer responsibility vis-à-vis (its) 45,000 employees and of their families who have been contributing for 18 years to the construction of Leroy Merlin Russia”. the country, its second market after France and where it achieves 18% of its global activity. to an expropriation, which would strengthen the financial means of Russia”, further declares Adeo, who says to apply “all the sanctions implemented by the countries of the European Union”, and to respect “all the directives of the French government” . Auchan also quoted by ZelenskyAt the microphone of Franceinfo, Jean-Marc Cicuto, a union representative of the company said he was “torn” by what he saw in Ukraine. “However, I don’t think it’s up to private companies to deal with conflict issues, which are government issues.” For him, “what is important is the social and salary protection of the 45,000 Russian employees”, just like that “of all the employees, whether they are Ukrainians, whether they are Russians, whether they be Polish, be they Romanian.”On Monday, employees of the Ukrainian branch of the brand which had asked Leroy Merlin, as well as the other brands of the Mulliez family association (AFM) present in Russia, Auchan and Decathlon, to cease their activities there, while a Leroy Merlin store, located in the Retroville shopping center in the north-west of kyiv, was bombed on Sunday evening, causing the death of at least eight people. The Instagram account official of Leroy Merlin in Ukraine “leroymerlin.ua” published a photo of the bombed store in kyiv on Monday with the words “stop sales in Russia” and a link to an online petition on the site “openpetition.eu”. Another brand of the Mulliez Family Association with a strong presence in Russia, Auchan, which has 231 Russian stores for a turnover of 3.2 billion euros, i.e. more than 10% of its worldwide activity, did not wish to of comment after the intervention of Volodymyr Zelensky before the French Parliament. See also on The HuffPost: Leroy Merlin bombarded in kyiv, this Ukrainian deputy challenges the direction of the group