{"id":101494,"date":"2024-02-22T21:59:00","date_gmt":"2024-02-22T21:59:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.estaql.com\/grant-shapps-says-government-to-take-very-close-look-after-sky-news-showed-uk-exports-helping-russias-war-uk-news\/"},"modified":"2024-02-22T21:59:00","modified_gmt":"2024-02-22T21:59:00","slug":"grant-shapps-says-government-to-take-very-close-look-after-sky-news-showed-uk-exports-helping-russias-war-uk-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/estaql.com\/seo\/grant-shapps-says-government-to-take-very-close-look-after-sky-news-showed-uk-exports-helping-russias-war-uk-news\/","title":{"rendered":"Grant Shapps says government to take ‘very close look’ after Sky News showed UK exports ‘helping Russia’s war’ | UK News"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Grant Shapps says government to take ‘very close look’ after Sky News showed UK exports ‘helping Russia’s war’ | UK News<\/h2>\n

Grant Shapps says government to take ‘very close look’ after Sky News showed UK exports ‘helping Russia’s war’ | UK News<\/p>\n

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The defence secretary has said the government will take a “very close look” after Sky News found UK exports are almost certainly helping Russia’s war effort in Ukraine.<\/p>\n

Drone equipment and heavy machinery are among items being sent to countries including Kyrgyzstan, Armenia and Uzbekistan, from where they are understood to be forwarded to Russia<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

Sky’s economics and data editor Ed Conway said it was undermining the official UK sanctions regime and bolstering Vladimir Putin’s war machine.<\/p>\n

Ukraine-Russia war latest: Navalny’s mother says she has seen her son’s body<\/strong><\/p>\n

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\n Mr Shapps says the government will investigate the apparent circumventing of sanctions
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Defence Secretary Grant Shapps<\/strong> told the House of Commons on Thursday: “I did read at length Ed Conway’s excellent thread talking about this issue.<\/p>\n

“It is the case that when you set up sanctions initially they tend to work, but they’ll eventually work their way and find another route to market.<\/p>\n

“As Ed Conway points out in the thread this is an international problem… I can assure him that the British government will be taking a very close look.”<\/p>\n

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Officially, flows of heavy machinery, electrical equipment and cars from the UK to Russia have dropped to nearly zero – with the government calling it “the most severe package of economic sanctions ever imposed”.<\/p>\n

However, Sky News analysis<\/strong> of Britain’s official trade statistics gives a different perspective.<\/p>\n

It shows that while UK firms’ exports to Russia have fallen sharply, exports to various former Soviet satellite states have risen at an unprecedented rate.<\/p>\n

Among items being exported are significant quantities of “dual use” items that can be repurposed into weaponry.<\/p>\n

Exports to four countries have risen by over 500% since the outbreak of war and, worryingly, by far the biggest class of goods being sent are “parts of aeroplanes, helicopters or unmanned aircraft”.<\/p>\n

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\n UK exports of sanctioned items
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\n Main UK items exported
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British exports to Kyrgyzstan, the small former Soviet satellite state, are up more than 1,100%, for example.<\/p>\n

These exports are dominated by heavy machinery and vehicles which can no longer be sent directly to Russia.<\/p>\n

They are also up nearly as sharply to Armenia, which according to Robin Brooks – former chief economist of financial body the IIF, has recorded a sharp increase in its onward exports to Russia.<\/p>\n

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\n UK goods exports to Armenia
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Mr Brooks said it’s been going on for some time and that other European countries, notably Germany and Poland, also send large quantities of hardware to Russia via these states.<\/p>\n

Read more:
Kremlin reacts after Biden calls Vladimir Putin a ‘crazy SOB’
Hit squad ‘eliminating’ Putin critics, says jailed opponent<\/strong><\/p>\n

He told Sky News that firms were “clearly getting an order from somewhere that is a Russian satellite that happens to be domiciled in one of these Central Asian countries”.<\/p>\n

He said the rise in exports was “completely insane” and that Russia was “the only reasonable explanation”.<\/p>\n

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Prior to Mr Shapps’s comments, the government told Sky News they are constantly attempting to tighten the sanctions regime.<\/p>\n

“Any non-compliance with these tough sanctions is a serious offence and punishable through large financial penalties or criminal prosecution,” said a spokesman.<\/p>\n

Foreign Secretary Lord Cameron<\/strong> added 50 more people and businesses to the UK sanctions list on Thursday.<\/p>\n

Some 2,000 individuals and companies have been sanctioned since the start of the war two years ago, according to the Foreign Office.<\/p>\n

The latest measures target companies linked to the manufacture of munitions, Russian importers and manufacturers of machine tools, and oil and diamond traders.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n

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Grant Shapps says government to take ‘very close look’ after Sky News showed UK exports ‘helping Russia’s war’ | UK News<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Grant Shapps says government to take ‘very close look’ after Sky News showed UK exports ‘helping Russia’s war’ | UK News Grant Shapps says government to take ‘very close look’ after Sky News showed UK exports ‘helping Russia’s war’ | UK News The defence secretary has said the government will take a “very close look” […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7711],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-101494","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-7711"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/estaql.com\/seo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/101494","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/estaql.com\/seo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/estaql.com\/seo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/estaql.com\/seo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/estaql.com\/seo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=101494"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/estaql.com\/seo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/101494\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/estaql.com\/seo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=101494"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/estaql.com\/seo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=101494"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/estaql.com\/seo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=101494"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}