Army officers and managers of the Lviv Armor Plant have been detained on suspicion of stealing budget funds allocated to buy parts for armored vehicles, Ukraine’s National Anti-Corruption Bureau or NABU said on July 14.
The bureau says its detectives arrested a colonel and major general from the Armed Forces Central Technical Management Bureau, as well as the director of the Lviv Armor Plant and his deputy.
The officials are accused of purchasing used engines for T-72 tanks instead of new ones for vehicles repaired at the Lviv plant.
The officials ran the scheme via an allegedly shell company, the owner of which has been detained as well.
“Moreover, those old engines, sometimes even non-operational ones, had already been sold before,” the NABU’s press service reported.
“In 2009-2009, they were being distributed to businesses in the domestic market as army surplus goods. Besides, the production of this model of engine stopped back in 1990, which the organizers of the scheme knew very well.”
In 2015, the suspects embezzled Hr 28.5 million ($1.1 million), the press service said.
NABU detectives started investigating the case in late November 2016 with the assistance of the Specialized Anti-Corruption Prosecutors’ Office.
Meanwhile, following the director’s arrest, Ukraine’s president Petro Poroshenko visited the Lviv plant on July 14 in the afternoon.
Up to Hr 920 million ($35.3 million) is to be allocated for the production of tanks, firefighting vehicles and armored cars in Lviv, Poroshenko said. In particular, up to 72 Ukrainian T-72 main battle tanks, as well as 20 Dozor-B cars were ordered to reinforce Ukraine’s armed forces by the end of 2017.
More Hr 300 milion were allocated to supply Ukrainian army with advanced Oplot tanks at Kharkiv Armored Plant, Poroshenko also said in Lviv.
The Lviv Armored plant is one of Ukraine’s three biggest enterprises (the others are in Kharkiv and Kyiv) engaged in repairing and modernizing Soviet-era main battle tanks – the core of Ukraine’s armored forces.
According to information provided by the Ukraine’s state-run defense industry concern Ukroboronprom, the Lviv Plant produces three modernized versions of the T-72, the world’s most widespread tanks – the T-72B, the T-72A(M1) and the T-72B-1.
Meanwhile, Ukroboronprom said on July 14 it had decided to dismiss Roman Tynkiv, the Lviv Armored Plant director, for the duration of inquiry by the NABU.
Over the past three years, the concern informed law enforcers of 158 incidences of fraud costing a total of Hr 657.2 million ($25.2 million), $10.4 million and 373,300 euros, UkrOboronProm’s press service said, adding that 41 criminal cases are now being investigated.
