Radio Svaboda: Fuel Could Have Been Imported To Ukraine From Belarus

With the use of fake certificates.

Fuel was imported into Ukraine using fake certificates. It could come from Belarus or Russia. Radio Svaboda writes about this.

Journalists drew attention to court decisions against the head of Yuma Trade LLC. Last year, the director was fined several times for violating customs regulations for the import of diesel fuel. As follows from court decisions, the fuel was imported on the basis of a certificate from the Lithuanian refinery Orlen Lietuva, but it later turned out that the Lithuanian company did not issue such a document. The customs service concluded that the fake certificate was used to hide the origin of the fuel, which could have originated in Russia.

Shortly after the start of the full-scale Russian invasion, Ukraine adopted technical regulations according to which the import of fuel from Belarus and Russia is prohibited during martial law.

At some point, Orlen Lietuva informed Ukrainian authorities that fuel suppliers could use its certificates to conceal the origin of fuel from Belarus and Russia. After this, Ukraine began checking the documents on the basis of which hundreds of customs declarations were issued.

The publication notes that the examinations mentioned in court decisions confirm that fuel indicators do not correspond to those stated in customs documents. However, the origin of petroleum products is not indicated in court decisions.

According to the publication, many companies were involved in the supply of petroleum products from the Baltic countries. Most often, they bought fuel from intermediaries who had never been involved in oil refining.

The fuel was delivered by sea from the Estonian port of Muuga to the port of Riga, where it was stored and processed on the territory of the SIA Pars Terminals SEZ. Tankers flying various flags, including Russian and Maltese, were involved. In Riga, the fuel was loaded into tank trucks and transported to Ukraine by road.