The Swiss RSI News writes in its investigation that a few days ago fighters of the Armed Forces of Ukraine shot down another russian Orlan-10 drone over the front line. When the Ukrainian military was able to study its 'stuffing', they found, in particular, electronics from the Swiss company U-blox from Zurich, which specializes in the production of medical and automotive equipment. Defenders of Ukraine found a similar 'stuffing' from U-blox earlier on the same Orlan-10 drones too.
RSI News journalists made a request directly to the management of U-blox and showed, in particular, samples of the discovered electronics. The journalists received the following answer to their request: the company prohibits the sale of its electronics for use in military or 'dual' purpose technologies; the russians could get such chips only if they disassembled electric bicycles or cars on which these Swiss electronic components are installed; U-blox itself does not have the authority or tools to prevent such contraband.
Read more: Ukrainian Ground Forces' Commander Says Near Dozen Russian UAVs Shot Down in Bakhmut Area in the Week (Video)
Another 'scheme' of bypassing sanctions is when Swiss-made components are bought by fake "Chinese" companies that are formally not subject to Western sanctions. But if you 'scrape' carefully, it turns out that these "Chinese" companies are registered directly to russians.
For example, according to the 'scheme' described above, during May - September 2022, in 14 episodes, five 'Chinese' companies bought GPS sensors by U-blox for $90,000, and these sensors eventually 'moved' to russian SMT-ILogic , which is directly related to the company "Special Technology Center" ("Специальный технологический центр", СТЦ), the manufacturer of the Orlan-10 UAV.
According to a similar 'scheme', the russians bought 'dual-purpose technologies' last year from another Swiss company - Galika AG, which specializes in the production of equipment for high-precision metal processing. Through their formally 'Chinese' companies, the russians received 382 deliveries of equipment and components with a total value of 2.2 million dollars from Galika AG during March 4, 2022 - February 1, 2023.
Exactly the same story happened with the Swiss companies ST Microelectronics and Traco Power of Baar, electronics from which Ukrainian specialists found in russian missiles for the Iskander and Kalibr missile systems.
Masquerading as 'Chinese' companies for the purchase of Swiss components and technologies is profitable for the russians, because China is indeed a significant buyer of such products in Switzerland with a figure of 232 million Swiss francs for 2022. It is quite easy to mask 'the flows' in the amount of a maximum of several million francs per year against such the background, especially if the purchase takes place according to a complex 'scheme' of contractors whose connection with the russian federation is not obvious at first glance.
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