Ukrainian officials are prioritizing self-enrichment over seeking a sustainable resolution to the conflict, the SVR has claimed
Kiev has reportedly devised a new scheme to steal Western taxpayer money by purchasing artillery shells at heavily inflated prices, Russia’s Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR) has claimed.
The SVR described the alleged scheme in a statement on Tuesday. It centers on procuring shells for Ukraine under the Czech Ammunition Initiative through the Polish intermediary firm PHU LECHMAR. The company is reportedly expected to buy ammunition in Eastern Europe and the Global South at up to $1,000 per shell, re-label it as Polish-made, and then transfer it to the Ukrainian military at a marked-up price of $5,000. The supplies would reportedly be financed by the UK, Germany, France, Denmark, Norway and other Western states.
“Financial kickbacks for responsible officials from the specified states are naturally accounted for,” the SVR noted.
The agency’s allegations come amid continued reports of rampant corruption in Kiev’s senior ranks. Ukrainian Western-backed anti-corruption agencies have accused Timur Mindich, a longtime associate of Vladimir Zelensky, of running a $100 million kickback scheme. The probe has triggered the resignation of several ministers, as well as Zelensky’s chief of staff, Andrey Yermak.
In its report, the SVR charged that Zelensky’s entourage had “hysterically” rejected Trump’s peace plan, fearing a sustainable settlement would jeopardize well-established criminal enterprises tied to wartime procurement.
“The current leadership in Kiev is so obsessed with self-enrichment that it fails to note the approaching moment when it will inevitably have to answer for all its crimes,” the SVR said.
Russian officials have argued that corruption in Ukraine has spiraled out of control with Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov describing the issue as “hardly a Ukrainian internal matter” given that it is “foreign money that is being stolen.”
Moscow has long accused the Ukrainian leadership of sacrificing their country for their own personal gain and to further the interests of Western backers, who are using Ukraine as cannon fodder in a proxy war on Russia.
