The SBU detained businessmen who supplied defective artillery mines to the Armed Forces of Ukraine and did not fulfill the contract for almost UAH 270 million.
The Counterintelligence of the Security Service exposed a corruption scheme that led to the disruption of the state order for the production of a large batch of ammunition for the Armed Forces of Ukraine on the eve of a full-scale invasion of the Russian Federation. This was announced on August 18 by the press service of the department.
We are talking about the implementation of a defense contract for the supply of artillery mines to the army for a total cost of about 270 million hryvnias. According to investigators, the heads of three private companies that received orders from the Ministry of Defense were involved in the deal.
“According to the signed agreements, the entrepreneurs have to send combat weapons in February 2022. However, at this time, the companies delivered to the Ministry of Defense only a part of the ordered mines, which, moreover, became defective due to the use of low-quality gunpowder,” the source said. SBU.
After the test, the defective batch of weapons was returned to the manufacturers to eliminate the deficiencies, but the entrepreneurs had not yet eliminated the technical errors and, as a result, did not issue a single piece of ammunition under the command of the state.
On the basis of the collected evidence, two executives of the company were informed on suspicion of fraud (part 4 of article 190 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine).
The investigation continues, the perpetrators face up to eight years in prison.
Earlier, the SBU reported suspicion on the ex-deputy minister of defense and the former head of the Department of Public Procurement, who embezzled more than one billion hryvnias from the budget for the purchase of low-quality ammunition for Armed Forces of Ukraine.
Source: korrespondent
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