BERLIN — German federal prosecutors on Monday arrested five men for allegedly violating European Union sanctions against Russia by exporting more than $30 million in industrial goods to customers that included at least 24 Russian arms manufacturers, the authorities said.
The suspects, who were arrested in the northern city of Lübeck and a neighboring district, ran a sophisticated export network that sent more than 16,000 shipments to Russia in breach of sanctions intended to punish Moscow for its war in Ukraine.
Authorities also launched coordinated raids at locations across Germany, including Frankfurt, Nuremberg and two districts in northern Germany.
Since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, European nations and the United States have leveled barrages of sanctions against Moscow but have had only minimal success in undermining the Kremlin’s war machine.
Some defenders of the sanctions policies say Russia’s economy is weakening, and the pressure may be increasing President Vladimir Putin’s willingness to negotiate. Critics say that the West has not done nearly enough to halt the war.
The E.U. is now working on its 20th sanctions package against Russia, which it hopes to approve this month.
Investigators said they believed that Russian state entities had allegedly aided the German suspects in establishing the network, and they estimated the total value of the illegal exports to be at least 30 million euros (about $35 million).
Prosecutors said the objective was to evade E.U. export controls targeting Russia’s industrial and defense sectors. They said at least 24 Russian arms manufacturers listed under E.U. sanctions were identified as recipients of the goods exported from Germany.
The suspects were identified as Artem I., a dual German-Ukrainian citizen, Boris M. and Eugen R., both German citizens, and Nikita S., a German-Russian citizen.
A fifth suspect, identified as Daniel A. and a dual German-Russian citizen, was provisionally detained. Prosecutors said five additional suspects were under investigation but remain at large.
All five of the suspects under arrest are believed to be members of a criminal organization that systematically violated Germany’s Foreign Trade and Payments Act, as well as corresponding E.U. regulations, by arranging prohibited exports to Russia, prosecutors said.
According to prosecutors, Nikita S. was the sole shareholder and managing director of a trading company based in Lübeck. Beginning no later than February 2022, the company was allegedly used to procure industrial goods for Russian companies to export them covertly.
To conceal the transactions, the suspects are believed to have relied on a web of shell companies, including at least one additional front company in Lübeck, fictitious buyers inside and outside the E.U., as well as a Russian company — in which Nikita S. was said to have held a “responsible position” — as the final recipient of the shipments.
Efforts at evading the sanctions have grown more sophisticated. A Russian “shadow fleet” has transported sanctioned cargo, including oil, in aging and disguised ships. Some goods are sent from Europe to third-party countries, then brought from there into Russia.
Just last week, the European Anti-Fraud Office announced an investigation into a major suspected scheme to circumvent E.U. sanctions against Russia. The investigation, which was initiated based on information from Polish authorities, involves more than 760 transport vehicles that were listed as being destined for Turkey but that were actually headed to Russia with suspicious exports, according to evidence gathered by Polish customs enforcement.
“Sanctions circumvention undermines the effectiveness of the European Union’s restrictive measures,” the anti-fraud office’s acting director, Salla Saastamoinen, said in a statement.
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