Translated material
"Basalt" stand
The CEO of a major defense company was arrested
At the end of last week, the Moscow Meshchansky Court issued a warrant for the arrest of the general director of the Federal State Unitary Enterprise “State Research and Production Enterprise (SNPP) Basalt” Vladimir Korenkov. The company he heads is one of the oldest and largest developers and manufacturers of ammunition in Russia, from aerial bombs to rounds for artillery systems. The prosecutor's office accuses him of abuse of power, expressed in the transfer of funds to a private company that contracted to build a grandstand and an observation deck at the enterprise's training ground, but never did so. The Basalt team and a number of well-known scientists and leaders in the military-industrial complex, in turn, sent an open letter to the country’s leadership, in which they called the actions of the investigators against Mr. Korenkov “the height of cynicism and legal lawlessness,” and the criminal case itself is clearly "custom"The criminal case against Mr. Korenkov, as it turned out from an open letter from his colleagues posted on the website of the State Scientific Enterprise “Basalt”, was initiated back in May 2005 on the initiative of the investigative unit of the 8th Main Directorate of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Russian Federation (serving “security” facilities) . A month later, the Moscow prosecutor's office for supervising the implementation of laws charged him with abuse of power. According to the investigation, on behalf of the general director of Basalt, in the summer of 2004, the company transferred 2.3 million rubles to the account of Tekhstroyreal LLC. This company was supposed to build and reconstruct stands and an observation deck to accommodate visitors to the Interpolitech exhibition at the testing site in Krasnoarmeysk, near Moscow. "Tehstroyreal", according to the investigation, did not complete the work, the money disappeared, and the construction work was eventually carried out by another company - Firma IV LLC - which was paid another 245 thousand rubles. As a result, the prosecutor’s office came to the conclusion that Mr. Korenkov “caused damage to the enterprise and the state in order to benefit unidentified persons.”
At a court hearing held late on Thursday evening in the Meshchansky Court, a representative of the prosecutor's office said that during the investigation Mr. Korenkov never appeared for questioning on a subpoena, and in addition, he could still put pressure on witnesses and disappear altogether. In turn, lawyer Ilya Vorobyov said that Vladimir Korenkov could not appear for questioning for a good reason, since he was in the hospital with a heart disease, which he repeatedly notified the investigation about. In addition, the defense lawyer noted, lately Mr. Korenkov had already been under the vigilant control of the investigation. In mid-September, he was placed in the Alekseevskaya psychiatric hospital, where he underwent a comprehensive inpatient forensic examination - investigators suspected that the general director was faking a heart disease.
However, the judge supported the side of the prosecutor's office, deciding to change Mr. Korenkov's preventive measure from a written undertaking not to leave the place to arrest. It is noteworthy that this decision was announced already at the beginning of the second night.
The general director of “Basalt” was immediately supported by the company’s staff and well-known scientists and managers of other defense enterprises in the world of the military-industrial complex, who posted on the Federal State Unitary Enterprise website the text of an open letter addressed to President Putin, the heads of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, the Prosecutor General’s Office, the Federation Council, the State Duma and the Accounts Chamber. It noted that the investigation into Mr. Korenkov’s case “is being conducted with gross violations of procedural norms, with particular cynicism and cruelty, with investigators confident in their impunity.” The authors of the letter also said: “No investigative actions that would make it possible to clarify the substance the case is not being conducted, and all the efforts of the investigators of the prosecutor's office and the special police are aimed at changing the preventive measure from a recognizance not to leave the place to the detention of the general director of the FSUE SNPP Basalt as a result of their actions, including interrogations, examinations, and searches. , seizure of documents that have nothing to do with the essence of the case, a non-working environment has been created in the enterprise team.”
The letter also notes that the case against Mr. Korenkov was initiated on the basis of a statement from the chief accountant of one of the Basalt branches, Poyarkova, whom he had once fired on suspicion of organizing thefts from the enterprise. However, since there was no trial at that time, Ms. Poyarkova returned to work following a court decision, but then quit of her own free will. And soon a statement about Vladimir Korenkov’s abuses appeared in the prosecutor’s office.
The lawyer for the general director of Basalt notes that the arrest coincided with the corporatization of the enterprise, and the company itself remains one of the few defense companies that have the right to independently export spare parts for their products. (FSUE "GNPP "Basalt" specializes in the development and production of aviation bomb weapons, mortar rounds, warheads for air-to-air and surface-to-air missiles, anti-tank grenade launcher systems, anti-sabotage naval grenade launchers, rounds for self-propelled and towed artillery systems.) The portfolio of export orders of the enterprise, which has entered into agreements for the supply of products with Turkey, the United Arab Emirates, Sudan, India, Syria, and Jordan, is close to $400 million. In light of this, the lawyer believes, it cannot be excluded that a criminal case in relation to Mr. Korenkov - an attempt to place a new person in the chair of the general director of Basalt. In his opinion, both officials and “black raiders,” for whom the Federal State Unitary Enterprise is now becoming an easy target, can be behind this.