Officers from Poland’s National Revenue Administration (KAS) and Internal Security Agency (ABW) carried out searches across the country on the order of the Łódź unit of the National Prosecutor’s Office, detaining four Belarusian citizens staying in Poland and two Polish citizens.
KAS said it had earlier stopped the attempted transfer of equipment “used to automate the process of producing integrated circuits used, among other things, in the assembly of combat drones.” It added that the action “could have contributed to disrupting supply chains of military equipment for the armed forces of the Russian Federation operating in eastern Ukraine.”
Prosecutor Katarzyna Calów-Jaszewska said the suspects were charged on the day of their detention with violations including Poland’s sanctions law, as well as fraud and fiscal penal offenses linked to foreign-exchange trading.
“Provisions in the sanctions law include, among other things, a ban on exporting devices of strategic significance that can be used in the production of military technologies,” she said, adding that violating the law, classified as a felony, carries a minimum of three years in prison.
A court in Łódź ordered three months of pre-trial detention for three suspects, while imposing police supervision, financial guarantees and a travel ban on the other three, prosecutors said. Investigators also seized cash in various currencies worth about PLN 400,000 (EUR 95,000), and said the case was ongoing.
Poland’s sanctions law was introduced on April 13, 2022, and is aimed at countering support for aggression against Ukraine by cutting off financing and support for states backing the aggressor, including Russia and Belarus, the statement said.
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Source: Polish Radio