Since August of 2020, the SBU has been conducting a pre-trial investigation upon the fact of treason. It is about deliberate actions, committed by officials of state enterprises, in order to harm state interests of Ukraine - in particular, in the field of military-technical cooperation and a defense-industrial complex.

One of the episodes of the criminal proceedings is a study of the article “Failure in Pakistan” published by Censor.Net on August 5, 2020. The article was about top managers of Ukroboronprom “knocking Ukraine out of the strategic arms market.” The author drew attention to the loss of Ukraine's markets for domestic products export due to the involvement of foreign companies affiliated with officials of Ukroboronprom and Ukrspetsexport.

During the pre-trial investigation it was established that Ukrspetsexport involved the company “R” in military-technical cooperation with a South Asian country. Despite direct warnings and a negative image in the arms trade market, this company was involved in both existing contracts and pre-contract negotiations, which were in the final stages.

Allegedly, representatives of the foreign company were provided with official information, which contains trade secrets about the state of military-technical cooperation between Ukraine and a South Asian country, the terms of possible foreign economic contracts, negotiations, etc.

According to the SBU, involvement of the company “R” actually spoiled concluding of a number of strategic contracts. This created conditions for entering the arms market not Ukrainian goods, but competing countries.

At the same time, some officials of Ukroboronprom and Ukrspetsexport deliberately hid and ignored letters from state-owned foreign companies, which testified to the negative reputation of the company “R” and the inexpediency of cooperation with it. And the command of the land forces of a foreign customer in 2020 generally included the company “R” in the “black” list.

We shall state that the officials of Ukroboronprom and Ukrspetsexport, as well as the company “R”, are related to the implementation of these contracts, as they worked together in the same specified company before being appointed to positions in the state concern and the company.

In general, subversive activities of the officials of Ukroboronprom, Ukrspetsexport and the company “R”, weakened Ukraine's military-technical cooperation with a foreign partner. At the same time, Russia intends to take advantage of this, which in turn poses a threat to Ukraine's national security.

Taking into account all these factors, the SBU on the basis of the decision of Shevchenkivskyi District Court in the city of Kyiv in order to prevent the destruction and concealment of evidence in criminal proceedings, on December 3, 2020 conducted searches of locations of Ukroboronprom, Ukrspetsexport and other participants in the proceedings.

We shall remind that the officials of Ukrspetsexport did not facilitate the investigation but artificially delayed conducting of investigation, hid documents and media, blocked the premises etc.

The investigation is ongoing. Based on the results of the evaluation of the collected materials and the evidence received, the pre-trial investigation will make decisions in accordance with the Criminal Procedure Code of Ukraine under the supervision of the Prosecutor General’s Office of Ukraine.