Bypassing the sanctions. Belarusian wood enters the EU under sham papers, 20 December 2022

In March 2022, the European Union banned imports of some Belarusian wood (articles of wood and wood charcoals under code 44). Once the sanctions came into effect, wood exports from Kazakhstan to the EU increased by 74 times; an upswing of almost 18,000 times was observed for Kyrgyzstan.

Kyrgyz companies with Belarusian trail unreservedly offer to supply sub-sanctioned products directly to the EU using forged documents. Belarusian Investigative Centre (BIC) learned about three such companies. One of them plans to bring “trainloads” of pellets to Europe.

After the introduction of sanctions, BLK Trading, a wood dealer registered in Poland, continues to make direct payments to its Belarusian state-owned headquarters. All the while, the company claims to be engaged in the supply of wood from Kazakhstan.

According to the BIC’s estimates, the indirect re-export of Belarusian wood to the EU through Kyrgyzstan and Kazakhstan brought some 30 million euros to its organisers. In part, this business is carried out by former Belarusian officials...

...When the BIC journalists turned to Agro KG and Admit for an official comment, the companies began to deny that they were bringing banned Belarusian products to the EU under sham papers. The co-founder of the SK Grand company said that she didn’t know about the supplies in circumvention of the sanctions and promised to look into it. We are awaiting her response.

The Vivalsa company may be involved in the trade in contraband products in Lithuania, as our colleagues from the Siena Investigation Center found out. Previously, this company sold pellets from Russia, but after the imposition of sanctions, the company began to supply Kyrgyz and Kazakh products. Siena’s journalists came to the company's warehouse under the guise of customers and found Agro KG products there. Saulius Girčys, director and co-owner of Vivalsa, admitted that these pellets are from Belarus...