SBU detained Ukrainian businessmen who helped Russia circumvent sanctions with a shadow fleet

The SBU exposed the management of the Ukrainian holding and their accomplices, who helped the Russian Federation circumvent sanctions on energy exports.

In 2023-2024, the defendants participated in the construction of a port-side plant for the production of liquefied gas in the Rostov region of the Russian Federation, the SBU reported.

The products manufactured at this enterprise were loaded onto tankers of the Russian “shadow fleet” and secretly sold in different parts of the world.

According to available data, Moscow directed most of the profits received from shadow trade to finance the war in Ukraine.

As a result of comprehensive measures in the Kyiv region, the SBU detained an equipment developer and a design engineer of the Ukrainian holding, who participated in the construction of the Russian plant.

Both defendants developed all the design documentation for the production facility and its technological capacities.

The officials forwarded the finished designs to Russian customers through the co-owner of the Ukrainian holding, who is located in the temporarily occupied part of the territory of the Donetsk region.

According to the case materials, he owns five companies in the city of Shakhty, Rostov region of the Russian Federation, which supply equipment to gas stations of the sanctioned corporations Gazprom and Lukoil.

His accomplice, who has his own gas station network in the temporarily occupied part of the territory in eastern Ukraine and refuels the military equipment of the occupiers, was also detained in Poltava region.

Currently, SBU investigators have informed the three detainees of suspicion under Part 1 of Article 111-2 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine (assistance to an aggressor state). The perpetrators are in custody, they face up to 12 years in prison with confiscation of property.

Also, the crimes of the co-owner of the Ukrainian holding and the director of the gas station network, who are located outside the territory controlled by Ukraine, were qualified in absentia under this article.

USM previously reported that officials of a Ukrainian holding are building a ship repair plant for Russian warships.