Belarusian timber subject to sanctions is exported to the European Union, passing it off as Kazakh wood. The Polish Ministry of Internal Affairs has started an investigation.
This is stated in an investigation by journalists of the Belarusian Investigative Center, the Radio Liberty project "Schemes" and the Polish edition of Gazeta Wyborcza.
After Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine, the European Union imposed sanctions on Belarusian timber. Recently, the increase in imports of wood products from Kazakhstan has been particularly noticeable: according to Eurostat, in 2022-2023, wood from this country was imported for a record-breaking amount of almost €126 million. Most of the supplies were to Poland. Before the full-scale war in Ukraine, Kazakhstan, which has only 5% of its territory covered by forests, hardly ever supplied wood to Europe. Belarus, on the other hand, annually exported about a billion euros worth of wood to Europe.
A significant increase in timber imports from Kazakhstan over the past two years may indicate that Russia and Belarus are circumventing sanctions. This opinion was expressed by Piotr Garstka, a representative of the Polish Chamber of Commerce and Industry for the Wood Industry.
The journalists obtained a contract for almost a million euros between the Kazakh company Nurr-electro and the Polish company PLRBL, as well as data on the product specification and customs declarations.
As it turned out, both signatures and stamps on the documents were forged. The carrier, a representative of the Belarusian company Gallardo, confirmed that the loading took place in Belarus.
The Polish Ministry of Foreign Affairs told the journalists that the issue of circumventing sanctions is not within their competence. The Polish Customs Service noted that they do not have the physical ability to check all customs declarations. A reply was received from the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Poland that an investigation has begun based on the facts stated in the request, but the agency refrained from further comment.
Earlier "Apostrophe" wrote that the Poles unblocked checkpoint on the border with Russia.