In December 2022, RUSI, Reuters and iStories published a joint investigation showing that critical Western manufactured components are still being traded to Russian companies involved in production of Russia's UAV Orlan used in attacks on Ukraine (see our story here). One of the companies mentioned in the report and accused of circumventing EU sanctions is Smart Index, a German wholesaler of IT products. Smart Index is suspected of selling electronic components to Russia via Turkey.

In February, Monitor published a report further substantiating the allegations against Smart Index. According to the report, the German company delivered the technology directly to Moscow until shortly before the start of the war. After the outbreak of the war, a director of Smart Index founded the company AZU International in Turkey, a country that doesn’t enforce most of the West’s sanctions against Moscow. Smart Index allegedly used AZU International to continue to export the components to Russia. Smart Impex responded that the allegations were being examined in detail and that its audits so far had shown that the goods it exported to Russia weren't subject to sanctions.

On the 9th of February, the German authorities searched the premises of Smart Index as part of an ongoing probe into the possible violation of European Union sanctions against Russia.