  We introduce partially-parity-time-symmetric (pPT-symmetric) azimuthal
potentials composed from individual PT-symmetric cells located on a ring, where
two azimuthal directions are nonequivalent in a sense that in such potentials
excitations carrying topological dislo-cations exhibit different dynamics for
different directions of energy circulation in the initial field distribution.
Such non-conservative ratchet-like structures support rich families of stable
vortex solitons in cubic nonlinear media, whose properties depend on the sign
of the topological charge due to the nonequivalence of azimuthal directions. In
contrast, oppositely charged vortex solitons remain equivalent in similar fully
PT-symmetric potentials. The vortex solitons in the pPT- and PT-symmetric
potentials are shown to feature qualitatively different internal current
distributions, which are described by different discrete rotation symmetries of
the intensity profiles.
