Following a report by the Lithuanian state-owned railway company to the Prosecutor General’s Office, an investigation has been commenced into suspected illegal exports of goods to Russia.
The railway announced the suspension of the transport of luxury cars as part of its efforts to reduce the risk of sanctions breaches.
The report to the Prosecutor was focussed on the activities of four companies and the transshipment of cars to Russia via other neighbouring countries.
It was reported today, that the Lithuanian State Consumer Rights Protection Authority has undertaken investigations into 95 Lithuanian companies on suspicion of importing Russian timber products in breach of current Russian and Belarusian sanctions.
The allegation is that the goods were being mislabelled as being of Kazakhstan or Kyrgyzstan origin.
Of those companies investigated nine have now been reported to prosecutors.
The Lithuanian authorities are investigating allegations of the import of urea from the Belarus company Grodno Azot (designated under Belarus sanctions).
Searches have been conducted at a number of locations and 3000 tonnes of urea has been seized valued at several million euros.
The imports are alleged to have been conducted by two companies and involved the relabelling of the product as if it had been produced by another supplier and not Grodno Azot.
We reported in an earlier post that the Lithuanian authorities had commenced an investigation into three companies suspected of breaching the EU’s Crimean sanctions.
The Prosecutor’s Office has today announced the conclusion of the investigation with no charges being brought.
The Lithuanian Prosecutor General’s Office has announced that the Lithuanian Financial Crime Investigation Service has opened an investigation into alleged breaches of the EU’s Crimean sanctions by three different enterprises:
a) two Lithuanian companies: BT Invest, and Hanner Group OÜ; and
b) one Crimean company owned by a Lithuanian: Pluošto Linija LLC.
It is understood that the allegation relate to investments and business dealings by Lithuanian nationals in Crimean companies and property developments in breach of the EU’s sanctions against Crimea.
