Former Siemens executives will be tried in Germany for supplying turbines to Crimea
A German court has decided to open criminal proceedings against two former managers of the engineering giant Siemens, who are accused of violating sanctions by facilitating the export of gas turbines to the Russian-occupied Crimea. About this informs Reuters.
The Hamburg court decided to continue the trial against two people, while the criminal prosecution of three others was dropped due to lack of sufficient grounds to continue the case. At the same time, the prosecutor’s office appealed the decision to terminate the case against the three defendants. The names of those involved in the case are not disclosed by the German judicial authorities.
A Siemens representative said the company could not comment on ongoing legal proceedings, but noted that the case did not involve Siemens as a company and that the individuals in question were no longer its employees.
We will remind that in accordance with the sanctions of the European Union and the USA, introduced after the occupation of Crimea by Russia in 2014, Western companies are prohibited from supplying energy or energy equipment to the peninsula. However, in 2017, Siemens turbines designed to generate electricity were delivered to two power plants that Moscow was building in Crimea.
At the time, Siemens said that the turbines were supplied to a Russian customer with the expectation that they would be installed at power plants in Russia, and the company was unaware of their subsequent transfer to Crimea.
