Businessman Timur Mindich, who is a figure in the case of "kickbacks" at "Energoatom," is accused of attempting to pressure the former Minister of Defense Rustem Umerov regarding the acquisition of body armor from a specific company.

As "Hvylya" reports, this was announced by the Deputy Chairman of the Public Anti-Corruption Council under the Ministry of Defense, journalist Tatyana Nikolaenko, as well as the PAR MoD.

The company in question is "Milicon UA," which the council is aware of because it "publicly and actively" countered the Ministry of Defense's attempts to purchase body armor from it.

"For a year I fought against the contract for body armor from the company 'Milicon,' because it was a corruption scheme, only to finally find out that... Mindich was behind it," Nikolaenko emphasized.

She also said that last winter, the State Rear Operator announced a tender worth 1.6 billion hryvnias for 75 thousand body armor, which an unknown company, "Fortetsya Zakhystu," entered and won at the lowest price.

However, it was not contracted due to the lack of a license to sell, while other Ukrainian manufacturers had one. Yet, according to the journalist, the SRO canceled the bidding because it "chose not the interests of the Ukrainian manufacturer, but a specific Mindich."

At the same time, a month later, a new tender for 200 million hryvnias appeared, which "Milicon UA" won with a body armor sample taken from "Fortetsya Zakhystu."

"The company failed the first stages of supplies; not Israeli body armor came to Ukraine, but Chinese crap — penetrable and crookedly sewn. And at every meeting on the SRO, I scolded, asking when they would finally terminate this contract. The SRO kept a poker face. They held on with their teeth and didn't terminate it," Nikolaenko recounted.

As a result, the agency terminated the contract on the very last day, and the state never paid for the body armor.

In turn, the PAR explained that the company "Milicon UA" positioned itself as a representative of the Israeli company "Masada." Furthermore, the founders of "Milicon" coincided with the founders of the company "Fortetsya Zakhystu."

They emphasized that the actions of the ministry's employees who "lobbied for clearly low-quality Israeli body armor" are incomprehensible to them.

"Unlike the corruption scheme at 'Energoatom,' where the supervisory board did not know or did not want to know about the existence of the scheme, in the Ministry of Defense, the pressure did not work, including thanks to the independent public council, accountable only and exclusively to civil society," the council stated.

They called for an investigation not only into the tapes but also to check other contracts of the Ministry of Defense.

It should be noted that a conversation between the "Mindich" case figures and the President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky was caught on an NABU wiretap audio recording. The prosecutor read an excerpt from the case in the courtroom.

Reference

Earlier, the Head of the National Security and Defense Council, Rustem Umerov, admitted to meeting with entrepreneur Timur Mindich while working as Minister of Defense. At the same time, he denied any influence from his side.

On November 10, NABU announced a large-scale anti-corruption operation called "Midas" in the energy sector.

According to investigation materials, the criminal group regularly received illegal payments from "Energoatom" partners amounting to 10-15% of the contract sum. Companies were forced to pay these funds to avoid delays in settlements for their services and goods or to retain the possibility of further cooperation.

Money laundering took place through an office in the capital that belonged to relatives of ex-Verkhovna Rada deputy Andriy Derkach, who is now a Russian senator—this information was provided by law enforcement representatives.

The representative of the Specialized Anti-Corruption Prosecutor's Office indicated that entrepreneurs Timur Mindich (with the pseudonym Carlson) and Oleksandr Tsukerman (Chief) were involved in the scheme.

According to the indictment, during the current year, Mindich influenced Minister of Energy Herman Halushchenko (Professor) and the Head of the Ministry of Defense Rustem Umerov (at that time).