Germany's Heller Tools sells equipment to FSB-linked firms - media
Heller Tools exported tools to companies affiliated with a smuggling ring set up by Russia’s FSB security agency.
That’s according to Financial Times, Ukrinform reports.
Heller Tools is believed to have sold drills and other tools worth a total of nearly $1.2 million to companies linked to the Sernia smuggling operation.
Heller Tools declared sales of $860,000 worth of goods to a Moscow-based company, TradeTools Trading House, which is linked to the Sernia network, between the start of the full-scale invasion of Ukraine and June 2023.
Customs records show Heller's exports to TradeTools were severed in June 2023, shortly after the FT questioned Heller about its trade operations with TradeTools.
However, by September, Heller Tools started selling goods to another Russian firm, Tirex. The firm that bought goods from the German company for another $300,000 was founded in June by a person who had previously worked at TradeTools.
Heller claims the company meets all legal requirements as construction tools it sells, such as saws and drills for steel or masonry, were not included on EU sanctions lists until December 2023, after their sale to Tirex.
They were added because they can contribute, in particular, to increasing Russia’s industrial potential.
In 2022, the U.S. Department of Justice indicted five individuals associated with Sernia for conspiring to procure military-grade, dual-use technology for Russian defense companies.
Among them was FSB Colonel Vadim Konoshchenok, who was detained by Estonian border guards as he was about to cross into Russia.
As Ukrinform reported earlier, Caterpillar heavy equipment is supplied to Russia by an official deale, the British company Vostochnaya Technica, despite Caterpillar’s withdrawal from Russia and amid U.S. and British sanctions already in place.