Ukraine's Prosecutor General tells of massive sell-off of military hardware between 2005 and 2014
During the period from 2005 to 2014, Ukraine sold more than 830 tanks, 710 combat vehicles and 200 aircraft, as stated by Ukrainian Prosecutor General Yuriy Lutsenko at a meeting of the Verkhovna Rada Committee on National Security and Defense on Friday. Lutsenko was presenting his report on the results of an investigation into Russia’s actions in eastern Ukraine.
According to him, such a large-scale sell-off served as one of the factors for Russia’s aggression.
"After the collapse of the Soviet Union, the Ukrainian army inherited 6,011 tanks, 5,791 combat vehicles, about 6,500 pieces of artillery and over 1,000 combat aircraft. This was the foundation for an independent Ukraine with an independent army. The largest sales occurred prior to 2005 and most of the documents are simply lost or destroyed", he said.
However, for the period from 2005 to 2014, there is complete documentation of large-scale selling off.
"For the 10 years, sales of the military equipment amounted to 1.837 billion hryvnias. Of these, the Armed Forces had sold 832 tanks, 232 helicopters, 202 aircraft, 714 IFVs and APCs, 4,930 cars, 28,555 units of missile and artillery weapons, 1,824 pcs. of firearms and ammunition for over 560 million", Lutsenko said.
Such transactions happened under every defense minister, but Mykhailo Yezhel and Yuriy Yekhanurov were the leading culprits.
"We have discovered sensational materials, which show that the former leaders of the Ministry of Defense brought the list of all available weapons, which is a top secret document, out of the Ministry and worked on it in order to ruin the battle capability of Ukraine," Lutsenko explained.