The Russian billionaires whose chemical factories fuel Russia’s conflict machine

Chemicals factories based or owned by a some of Russian’s wealthiest men are delivering ingredients to plants that manufacture explosives utilized by Moscow’s military throughout the war in Ukraine, an analysis of railway and financial data indicates.

Reuters recognized 5 chemical enterprises, in which five Western-sanctioned billionaires preserve stakes, that give more than 75% of the key chemical compounds shipped by rail to a number of Russia’s biggest explosives factories from the start of the war until September this year, according to the railway statistics.

The news enterprises evaluation demonstrates for the primary time how closely factories forming a part of Russia’s war machine depend upon those men and their enterprises.

The billionaires encompass Roman Abramovich, former owner of Chelsea Football Club, and Vagit Alekperov, who become ranked with the aid of Forbes in April as Russia’s richest man with a fortune estimated at $28.6 billion.

Abramovich and Alekperov did not respond to requests for remark despatched through their enterprises or lawyers. London-listed Evraz, wherein Ambramovich holds a 28% stake, said it supplied the chemical compounds for “civilian use only”. Lukoil, a refiner wherein Alekperov retains a shareholding, stated it “does not manufacture explosives or any related components”.

Anna Nagurney, a University of Massachusetts professor who intently studies deliver chain networks related to the Ukraine-Russia war and reviewed Reuters’ findings, stated the five enterprises were helping Moscow not only by providing imparting chemical components for munitions however also by earning lots-needed hard foreign money from exports of civilian products, such as fertilizers.

“These chemical enterprises may be working as civilian ones, but they are sustaining the conflict effort,” Nagurney stated.

To decide from wherein Russia’s fundamental munitions factories acquired their supplies, Reuters analysed the motion of greater than 600,000 rail shipments that carried the chemical compounds needed to make explosives from the invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 via September 2024.

The railway data from two commercial databases in Russia turned into supplied to Reuters through the Open-Source Centre, a British-based NGO dedicated to amassing publicly-available intelligence and tracking potential sanctions violations. It designated the form of shipment in every railway wagon, the weight, origin and destination, and the names of the enterprise that sent the products and the company that received them.

Reuters cross checked the data from the two databases to confirm its accuracy. However, the news agency became not able to verify whether the data covered every rail shipment to the explosives factories, or the extent to which the plants received deliveries by road.

The data showed that the billionaires’ enterprises provided vital substances to five explosive and gunpowder factories in Russia that are subjected to Western sanctions. The plant are subsidiaries of the massive Russian nation arms producer and automaker Rostec.

Using leaked tax invoices covering parts of 2023, Reuters was additionally able to verify that four of the chemical compound’s corporations had been suppliers to four of the explosive’s producers.

Neither the Kremlin, the defense ministry, nor Rostec spoke back to Reuters’ questions about civilian enterprises’ role in supplying Russia’s munitions industry.

Before the conflict, all the explosives’ plants, as a part of efforts to diversify, also used to make explosives or gunpowder for civilian use. Reuters could not determine whether such civilian income preserve and whether the chemical compounds supplied is probably earmarked for civilian utilization.

Thomas Klapotke, a professor of energetics at the University of Munich, who helped Reuters examine the information, stated that, even as all the raw substances had many capability uses, the combination of wagon-loads of specific chemicals wanted for explosives production arriving at specific plant provided “red flags”.

The evaluation giving fresh proof that the West’s method of enforcing sanctions on Russia as punishment for its invasion of Ukraine has failed to curb its army production, in line with several specialists interviewed with the aid of Reuters.

While the billionaires themselves are all under Western sanctions, the chemical enterprises involved have largely escaped predominant financial consequences or bans on their import of important items from the US or the European Union.

Most of the output of these chemical plants are civilian products like fertilizer which can be crucial to farming. Long-status Western policies exempt food from sanctions to prevent famine and diplomatic blowback from developing nations.

Peter Harrell, a former senior White House reliable who worked on Russia sanctions at some stage in the battle’s first year and is now a scholar on the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, stated possibly it is time to check the ones 2022 choices now that nations that when depended on Ukraine and Russia for wheat and fertilizer have had time to locate alternative sources.

“Potentially, the calculus could weigh in the direction of imposing sanctions on these enterprises nowadays,” Harrell stated, commenting on Reuters’ findings.

However, Manish N. Raizada, an agriculture professor at the University of Guelph in Canada, warned that imposing sanctions on Russian chemical enterprises could positioned hundreds of millions of small-scale farmers at hazard, in return for a minor economic effect on Russia.

Spokespersons for the U.S. Treasury Department, which coordinates Washington’s sanctions, and the United Nations Development Program declined to comment on Reuters findings.

A European Commission spokesperson, in reaction to questions about the chemical’s enterprises, stated: “We are actively exploring the possibilities for added measures to step up stress and close loopholes in a way that could avoid poor implications for food safety.”

The spokesperson stressed that any movement could best come after careful evaluation of the effectiveness of any measures and their impact on European enterprises. However, he noted that EU sanctions might already follow to the enterprises, although they had been no longer specially detailed, in the event that they have been controlled or owned by a sanctioned individual.

Artillery War

The conflict in Ukraine has grow to be an artillery duel in which a scarcity of excessive explosives available to NATO and Ukraine has allowed Russian forces to gain swathes of territory this year, in step with more than one Ukraine commanders interviewed by Reuters.

Moscow is making an investment closely in military production and seeking to fill up its munitions stockpiles. In 2024, Russia produced approximately 2.4 million artillery rounds and imported 3 million from North Korea, in keeping with a Ukraine safety reliable. The North Korean embassy in London didn’t return calls from Reuters looking for comment.

The five munitions plant supplied by way of the billionaires’ enterprises include the big Sverdlov facility in Dzerzhinsk. The plant is the significant maker in Russia of the plastic explosives HMX and RDX used in artillery and missiles, in line with a Ukrainian intelligence officials.

Two factories run through Eurochem – founded by way of Russian billionaire Andrey Melnichenko – supply chemicals to Sverdlov, consistent with the railway data.

Eurochem is one of the world’s largest producers of mineral fertilizers. Its Nevinnomysskiy Nitrogen plant in southwest Russia has despatched at the least 38,000 metric tons of acetic acid to Sverdlov during the Ukraine warfare, according to a Reuters analysis of the railway records.

A second Eurochem facility, Novomoskovskiy Nitrogen sent almost 5,000 metric tons of nitric acid to Sverdlov in the same time, the railway records confirmed.

Both acetic acid and nitric acid are used to make HMX and RDX.

According to Reuters calculations, primarily based on scientific literature and reviewed by an explosives expert, 5,000 tons of nitric acid will be used to make 3,000 tons of RDX, sufficient to fill 500,000 big-calibre artillery shells.

The tax invoices reviewed by way of Reuters showed that Eurochem was a dealer to Sverdlov from last year.

In reaction to specified questions, Eurochem said Reuters’ reporting contained “numerous material authentic mistakes”. Specifically, “EuroChem is not part of the defence sector of the Russian economy and none of our merchandise are designed for army purposes,” examine a assertion from the enterprise, that is centered in Switzerland. Eurochem said that any proposal Melnichenko controlled the enterprise became false.

Melnichenko did not reply to questions. The billionaire, said by Forbes to be well worth $17.5 billion, located his controlling stake in Eurochem into a accept as true with that benefits his spouse, as Reuters has mentioned, after the imposition of sanctions on him by the EU and Nato following the invasion of Ukraine.

The statement stated that while 97% of its output is fertiliser, Eurochem supplies other commercial products, inclusive of these chemicals, to a huge number of clients in Russia and abroad. The company failed to answer Reuters’ questions about the chemical shipments to Sverdlov. Questions sent to the e-mail address on Sverdlov’s website went unanswered.

Tax Data

Another fertilizer giant, Uralchem, founded by sanctioned billionaire Dmitry Mazepin, provided Sverdlov more than 27,000 metric tons of ammonium nitrate, the railway information showed. Ammonium nitrate is used to make HMX and RDX, and is likewise blended with TNT to produce an explosive known as Amatol. Uralchem additionally supplied 6,000 metric tons of nitric acid from its nitrogen fertiliser plant in Berezniki to Sverdlov, the data confirmed.

Two different nation owned munitions plants, the Tambov Gunpowder Plant and Kazan Gunpowder Plant, acquired shipments of acids from Uralchem, the rail data confirmed.

The leaked Russian tax invoices, reviewed through Reuters, also revealed that Uralchem supplied the Sverdlov, Tambov and Kazan factories in addition to the state-owned Perm Powder plant previous year.

Asked in detailed about the shipments, Uralchem stated the records was “wrong”. It did not offer in addition details or clarification.

Mazepin, who decreased his ownership of the company from 100% to 48% just after the invasion of Ukraine, could not be reached for comment. The Tambov, Perm and Kazan plants did not respond to questions sent to e-mail addresses listed on their websites or on corporate filings.

A metallic plant in Siberia owned through London-listed Evraz supplied 5,000 metric tons of toluene – an ingredient for TNT – to the Biysk Oleum Plant, consistent with the rail information. Evraz turned into sanctioned in 2022 by means of the British government which said it provided steel to the Russian army.

In a announcement, Evraz said it only provided toluene for “civilian use only”. The Biysk Oleum plant, a unit of Sverdlov, failed to respond to requests for comment.

In April 2024, the authorities of Altai place, which includes the city of Biysk, indexed the plant among producers that “drastically accelerated” their 2023 manufacturing in fulfilment of state defence procurement contracts.

Reuters diagnosed other billionaire-linked enterprises providing chemical compounds to munitions factories. The Sredneuralsk Copper Smelting Plant (SUMZ) in the Ural mountains, founded by way of metals magnate Iskander Makhmudov, affords oleum – additionally called fuming sulphuric acid – used in the Tambov, Kazan, and Perm powder plants.

The Lukoil refinery in Perm provided 6,500 metric tons of toluene to the Perm powder plant, Kazan, and Biysk. Lukoil is partly owned via billionaire Alekperov, the enterprise’s former president. Like others, he divested many shares in 2022 however retained an 8.55% stake.

The tax invoices reviewed via Reuters showed that the Lukoil plant became a dealer to the Perm powder plant last year. They additionally document shipments from SUMZ to the Kazan and Perm vegetation.

In a declaration, Lukoil stated its Perm refinery “does not production explosives or any associated components” and that questions from Reuters about shipments from there contained “absurd speculations”.

SUMZ did not respond to distinctive questions. Its discern organization, UMMC, that’s under sanctions with the aid of the United States and Britain, did no longer reply to a request for comment. Makhmudov, who divested his controlling stake in 2022, according to Forbes, additionally couldn’t be reached for comment.