According to journalists, Khoroshaev, who was a member of the supervisory board of the Slovak intermediary firm, is in custody.
Izrenie” , one of the defendants in the case of the disrupted purchase of ammunition for Ukraine, Alexei Khoroshaev, has been detained in the Czech Republic. Journalists' interlocutors in law enforcement agencies reported that Khoroshaev has been in custody since September 5.
According to the source, “his entourage hopes that he will succeed soon. And the Czechs say that he will sit until everything is unraveled.” In Ukraine, Khoroshaev is considered a co-organizer of the criminal scheme at the Lviv Arsenal.
Khoroshaev – before the full-scale invasion, he worked at the state-owned special importer Progress. At the beginning of the full-scale invasion, he was abroad and joined the management of Sevotech, a company that was supposed to supply ammunition to the Lviv Arsenal.
According to the investigation, Khoroshaev, as a representative of the Sevotech supervisory board, decided to appropriate funds allocated for the purchase of ammunition. To do this, he allegedly created an organized group, which included the then official of the Ukrainian Ministry of Defense, Liev (he was the one who signed the agreement under the Ministry of Defense).
Another Ukrainian, Vladislav Klishchar, was on the supervisory board of this company, who several weeks ago was suspected of embezzling funds in another case.
The Lviv Arsenal Case
In November 2022, hromadske journalists published an article about the disrupted procurement of ammunition for the Ministry of Defense. According to the media, the supply scheme included companies that could have been so-called intermediaries. This is a contract for the supply of mortar mines with the Lviv Arsenal, a contract for 30,000 tank rounds with the Croatian WDG Promet, and 15,000 sets of helmets and body armor with the Slovak Sevotech. A few months before the agreement with the Ministry of Defense, in August 2022, Lviv Arsenal signed a contract with the Slovak company Sevotech, which is not a major player in the arms market, but has been present on it for 20 years. Sevotech was supposed to bring 100 thousand mines to Ukraine for almost UAH 1.5 billion. “Lviv Arsenal” was supposed to only receive funds from the Ministry and transfer them further, keeping 3% for itself – exactly as much as was allowed by the Cabinet of Ministers' resolution.
“Lviv Arsenal” received more than 1 billion in advance payment, part of which it then transferred to its intermediary Sevotech. Most of the amount went to the accounts of another intermediary, and the money disappeared there, and the mines were never planted.
This year, the SBU announced suspicions to five people for embezzlement of funds for the purchase of shells. Suspicion was received by the former and current heads of the Department of Military-Technical Policy, Development of Armaments and Military Equipment of the Ministry of Defense, the head and commercial director of the company “Lviv Arsenal”, as well as their accomplice – a representative of a foreign commercial structure. According to LB.ua sources in law enforcement agencies, Liev, the head of the Department of Military-Technical Policy Toomas Nahkur and the head of the Lviv Arsenal Yuriy Zbitnev were suspected.