Russia smuggling sensitive technologies from Europe to fuel its war in Ukraine, report

Despite stringent sanctions from the West, a Russian spy network has reportedly managed to smuggle sensitive technology from European Union companies to strengthen Kremlin's war in Ukraine.

The spy network managed to dodge US sanctions to obtain machine tools from Germany and Finland. Some of the smuggled technologies and equipment can be even used for developing hyper-sonic weapons, claims the report.

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The ‘Serniya network’ has come under the US Department of Justice's radar for its alleged involvement in "highly sensitive and classified procurement activities” on behalf of Russia’s FSB spy agency, found a Financial Times investigation report.

The investigation also found that the ‘Serniya network’ used to work for Russia's Directorate for Scientific and Technological Intelligence, Foreign Intelligence Service, Russia’s Ministry of Defence, and Rosatom, the state atomic energy company in charge of the country’s nuclear arsenal.

Even after US sanctions on Russia, one of the controllers of the Serniya network continued to procure items inside the European Union in the name of another Russian company, FT found in its investigation.

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Since the beginning of the Russia-Ukraine war, Trading House Treydtuls, which was registered to a Russian address, has acquired $900,000 of materials consisting of microchips and items for industrial manufacturing mostly from EU countries.

The registered address of Treydtuls reveals its connection with the Serniya network. The report showed that Treydtuls is registered at the same address as Robin Trade, which is a part of the Serniya network. Moreover, the company is owned by the same person, a Russian national called Alexey Zibyrov.

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Data reveals that Robin Trade has transported $12.2 million worth of goods to Russia up to April 2022. By the end of 2022, Treydtuls imported 22 tonnes of equipment from Germany to Russia in 2022.

It also bought $253,000 of integrated circuit boards from a small company in Singapore. Notably, these products were manufactured by US-based groups Analog Devices, Texas Instruments, Altera, and the German company IC-Haus. Directly, it is difficult to trade the goods of these companies to Russia as they have ceased exports to the country.

Other than finding enough pieces of evidence to prove the clandestine trading of weapons and equipment from the EU to Russia, the FT report couldn't find pieces of evidence to suggest that the involved EU companies were aware of the Russian roots of their trading partner, Treydtuls.