A court has arrested a former Ministry of Defence official who supplied substandard machine guns to the front

A court has arrested a former Ministry of Defence official who supplied substandard machine guns to the front

The court has arrested a former official of the Ministry of Defence and the head of a state enterprise who, through a corruption scheme, supplied the front line with only 200 unfit machine guns instead of 400 certified units, causing the state losses of 193 million hryvnias. The weapon turned out to be a cheap analog without technical documentation.

This was reported by the State Bureau of Investigation (SBI). Bureau employees found that in 2022, a Ministry of Defence official, together with the heads of a state enterprise, were supposed to supply 400 certified large-caliber machine guns to the front. However, during an inspection, it was found that:

• only 200 machine guns were supplied, which is half of the planned quantity;
• instead of certified weapons, cheap analogs that did not meet technical requirements were provided;
• the purchased weapons did not have marking, accompanying documents, or technical documentation.

The unfitness of the machine guns was revealed during combat use: the weapons could not provide continuous fire, and after the first shots, they failed due to damage to parts and mechanisms. Due to this transaction, the state lost more than 193 million hryvnias.

However, the worst part is that Ukrainian soldiers who received this weapon faced a real threat due to its unfitness in combat conditions. The district court of Poltava chose a preventive measure for the former Ministry of Defence official in the form of detention with the possibility of posting bail of over 9 million hryvnias.

A similar preventive measure with bail of 18 million hryvnias was chosen for one of the state enterprise’s leaders. Both suspects were sent to a correctional facility from the courtroom.

The decision regarding the preventive measure for the third defendant in the case is still pending. The procedural supervision in this case is carried out by the Specialized Prosecutor’s Office in the Defence Sphere of the Prosecutor General’s Office. The former Ministry of Defence official is charged with:

• misappropriation of property through abuse of office in particularly large amounts (Part 5 of Article 191 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine);
• obstructing the lawful activities of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, leading to grave consequences (Part 2 of Article 114-1 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine).