The Prosecutor’s Office of Bulgaria announced on Tuesday the indictment of five alleged members of an international network, suspected of circumventing the embargo imposed by the European Union (EU) on the supply of military equipment to Russia, in the amount of two million euros, News reported. ro quotes AFP.

The material, purchased in Europe in early 2021, was recovered in Bulgaria and then secretly shipped to Russia by the Russian director of a trading company based in Plovdiv (south).

Russian units are involved

The list of these materials includes optical viewfinders, binoculars, aeronautical radio communication, ballistic computers and software, regional prosecutor Vanya Khristeva said at a press conference.

According to the president of the Bulgarian National Security Agency, Plamen Tonchev, these articles were intended for Russian units that participated in the war in Ukraine, such as the Wagner paramilitary group.

Initially, 12 people were arrested, including three Russians, one Belarusian and one Albanian.

The five detainees were accused of “participation in an organized criminal group” and “illegal export”, which are punishable by up to ten years in prison.

The network also operated in the UK, Switzerland, Serbia, Singapore and the United Arab Emirates (UAE), police said, adding that they were investigating in cooperation with foreign intelligence agencies.

The EU first banned arms exports to Russia after Moscow annexed Ukraine’s Crimean peninsula in 2014, then tightened the rules by imposing sweeping sanctions after Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022.

Bulgaria – a member state of the EU and NATO – demonstrates its support for Kyiv, but part of the population and political class of this country, which is historically and culturally close to Moscow, carefully manages the interests of Russia.