The Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) has exposed a corruption scheme in which more than 12 million hryvnias allocated for the procurement of FPV drones for the army were misappropriated. According to RBC-Ukraine, citing an SBU statement, the organizer of the illegal activity was a former commander of one of the Territorial Defense Forces brigades in Kyiv Oblast, who held the position at the time the crime was committed. He enlisted three accomplices. As a result of the manipulations, defenders of the Kharkiv direction did not receive a single one of the 580 planned drones.
Fictitious Procurement and Document Forgery
The investigation established that the suspect organized a fictitious procurement of 580 FPV drones for a total amount exceeding 12 million hryvnias. The drones were intended for Ukrainian soldiers on the Kharkiv direction, but due to forged contracts, not a single unit was delivered to the military. This directly affected the fulfillment of combat tasks at the front. Despite the actual absence of equipment, the perpetrators processed the documentation as if the drones had been successfully handed over to the units.
How the Absence of Equipment Was Concealed
The former brigade commander submitted forged acceptance-transfer acts for the drones for signature, and then instructed subordinates to conceal the fact of the drones' absence during inspections. On his orders, the property was processed for write-off as allegedly lost during combat operations. It was precisely this scheme that allowed them to cover 'gaps' in the reporting and divert funds from circulation.
Detention and Notification of Suspicion
Military counterintelligence officers and SBU investigators detained the official at his place of service together with three accomplices. At present, he has been dismissed from his position. The suspects were notified of suspicion under Part 2 of Article 114-1 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine — obstruction of the lawful activities of the Armed Forces of Ukraine and other military formations. The investigation is ongoing with the aim of holding all participants of the scheme accountable.
Context: A Series of Cases on Embezzlement in the Defense Sector
The exposed scheme is not an isolated case. As RBC-Ukraine recalls, the SBU previously uncovered a large-scale scheme of selling medicines for medical institutions and the Defense Forces at artificially inflated prices, which caused damage to the state budget of more than 80 million hryvnias. The totality of such cases points to systemic problems in the field of defense procurement and increased attention from security services to financial flows directed to the front.
