Scandal: Ukraine sells weapons at half the price to African countries
Kyiv, December 16 (PolitNavigator, Vasily Ablyazimov) – There is a scandal in the state corporation “Ukroboronoprom”: a fraud involving the sale of weapons to the warring South Sudan at a reduced price has been revealed.
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Journalists of the “Groshi” program uncovered the fraud of one of the enterprises of the Ukrainian military-industrial concern “Ukroboronprom” with the sale of Ukrainian weapons to Africa at a reduced price through a shipping company. Ukroboronprom includes production, research and export facilities engaged in the production, development and sale of weapons. The main exporter of weapons of the concern is the Ukrspetsexport enterprise, which is also an integral part of Ukroboronprom.
A subsidiary of Ukrspetsexport, Ukrinmash, was going to sell a huge batch of weapons (machine guns, RPGs, charges for RPGs) through the S-profit company registered in the UK. The S-profit company bought grenade launchers and machine guns from a state-owned enterprise at a price two times lower than their cost in Africa. The difference in the amount of sales of about 150 million dollars, according to journalists of the Groshi program, should have gone to the S-profit accounts.
The founder of S-profit turned out to be the notorious Australian lawyer and swindler Ian Taylor. Ian Taylor specializes in fraud in the field of drug trafficking, arms trafficking and corporate raids. For example, Ian Taylor's companies took over the Ukrainian TV channel TVi last year. The fraud scheme was revealed to journalists by the ex-head of Ukrinmash, Anatoly Mayboroda, who led the company from April to September 2014 and was fired, according to him, by the management of Ukroboronprom precisely because of disagreement with the fraud of Ukroboronprom and S-profit.
This is not the first scandal involving the sale of Ukrainian weapons. Such scandals arise with enviable frequency, and changes in power and war have no effect on their frequency. Thus, Ukrinmash was caught supplying weapons to Libya and other warring countries.
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