One of the African countries unexpectedly became the main supplier of spare parts for Russian aircraft

Last year, the Russian Federation, which has serious problems with aviation, imported aircraft spare parts from abroad in the amount of approximately 2 billion dollars, and 1.5 billion dollars of it went to the Gabonese company Ter Assala Parts. This is reported by The Moscow Times with reference to Russian customs data.

According to the publication, the company is “linden”. There is no data about her in the database of legal entities of an African country. The beneficiary of the company is an unnamed citizen of Kyrgyzstan, and the place of registration of the company is a residential building in the Gabonese capital, Libreville.

According to The Moscow Times, the amount of imported products exceeds half of Gabon’s annual budget. In addition to this, Russian companies for which aircraft spare parts were imported have signs of shell companies.

It is known that Ter Assala Parts sent parts for Boeing and Airbus aircraft to Russia. In particular, it was about oxygen masks, washers, pipes, bolts, nuts, brackets, fuel supply regulators, computers and warning systems.

In addition, 15 second-hand engines for Boeing-737 and Airbus A320/A321 aircraft worth more than $58 million were imported from Gabon.

Buyers of spare parts in the Russian customs declarations are listed as Obedinenie postabstkov LLC, Kvantum LLC, and Protector LLC. The lion’s share falls on the first of them ($1.2 billion).

According to experts, the scheme may be more complicated than it seems at first glance: both Russian and Gabonese officials may be involved in it.

“This is a private company that was invented in Gabon to conduct customs transactions, and then it will disappear. I think there is some kind of structure that is registered in one way in the documentation, but appears in a different way in the customs declarations. Accordingly, someone, apparently , in the administration of Gabon, it is covered. The government (Russian. – Ed.), apparently gives the so-called carte blanche,” says Doctor of Economics Igor Lipsyts.

Russian aviation faces difficulties

Because of the sanctions imposed by the West, Russian aviation is increasingly facing technical difficulties. Only in the first eight days of December last year, civilian Russian planes encountered at least eight serious mechanical breakdowns and were forced to make emergency landings.

The problem lies in the lack of necessary spare parts, which leads to neglect of safety standards. According to experts, the situation in this area will only worsen for the Russians.

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