BAB: Ukraine lost 300 million due to resale of barbed wire

Ukraine's state budget lost UAH 300 million due to schemes involving the resale of barbed wire for fortifications.

According to the agency's press service, the BES sent a recommendation to the Ministry of Justice.

According to the BES analysts, more than 60% of Egoza barriers manufactured by the penitentiary institutions of the State Penitentiary Service are sold to intermediary companies. As a result, the budget has already lost about UAH 300 million since the beginning of the year.

Analysts have found that manufacturers sell up to 45% of the total volume of such products directly to government agencies, and the rest - through commercial enterprises. The latter then set a markup of up to 45% when reselling the goods to government agencies.

"In the context of armed aggression, military state administrations are forced to buy barrier obstacles at an inflated price from commercial enterprises, although the products are manufactured by state institutions. However, they mostly refuse to purchase these materials for fortifications," said Andriy Pashchuk, Deputy Director of the BES.

According to him, this is due to allegedly already concluded agreements with intermediaries and the lack of opportunities to increase production.

To eliminate the preconditions for budget losses, the Bureau sent a recommendation to the Ministry of Justice to monitor the volume of sales of Egoza-type barriers and subtle obstacles to commercial enterprises. The BES experts also proposed to consider prioritizing the fulfillment of orders from government agencies.

Earlier it was reported that detectives of the Bureau of Economic Security of Ukraine (BES) served Ihor Kolomoisky with a notice of suspicion of committing three crimes under Articles 200, 191 and 209 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine.