A large-scale redistribution of property is taking place in the occupied territories of Ukraine, in particular, agricultural holdings, factories and mining enterprises are coming under the control of the Russians. It identified more than 1,000 companies in Melitopol, Berdyansk, Mariupol, Lysychansk and Severodonetsk, which are now registered as Russian legal entities.
Pro-Russian businessmen under the guise of the military use looting, racketeering and kidnapping to extract valuable assets.
In particular, until December 2022, the Russian authorities established control over 400 enterprises of the Zaporizhzhia region under the pretext of preserving jobs and protecting factories from theft.
Granaries, food factories, industrial workshops, markets, pharmacy chains, shopping centers were under the control of the military. Last fall, these objects began to appear in the Russian register of legal entities, and at the moment, more than 1,000 Ukrainian companies in Mariupol, Melitopol and other occupied cities have been transferred to Russian jurisdiction.
It is noted that among 262 enterprises whose founder is indicated in the state register of legal entities of the Russian Federation, 20 have changed owners. Seized assets include agricultural holdings, bread factories and mining companies. Russians usually become the new owners of Ukrainian businesses: 150 founders of enterprises in large occupied cities have Russian citizenship, and only 14 – Ukrainian. They open new factories or expand their companies in the annexed territories. Most often, these are entrepreneurs from Moscow, the Rostov region, as well as the Crimea.
Only in Melitopol alone, as the chairman Ivan Fedorov reported, hundreds of businessmen turned to the police and Security services of Ukraine (SBU) to record the seizure of property.
During the year of occupation, the authorities of the Zaporizhzhia region discovered more than 4,000 “derelict objects” – from pharmacies to granite quarries. As a rule, their owners were forced to abandon their property with the arrival of the occupiers.
More than 10 industrial enterprises in Zaporizhzhia have already registered new owners. Their production is reoriented to the Russian market, and some factories are directly used for the needs of the Russian army.
In particular, on June 3, 2022, Russian soldiers entered the territory of agricultural machinery factories in Melitopol, owned by HydroSyla. The company announced the loss of control over its Zaporizhzhia enterprises. Two months later, the Russian mass media wrote about the resumption of supplies of “HydroSyla” to Russia, and the SBU accused the company of supplying equipment to Russian defense plants.
At the same time, armed men entered the territory of the Tokmak granite quarry in the Zaporizhzhia region – the largest producer of crushed stone in the region. In November, the quarry appeared in the Russian register of legal entities with a new founder – the Crimean firm Center for Economic Cooperation of the Republics, one of whose owners is Yaroslav Tybekin. His wife, Tetyana Tybekina, is registered with another mining enterprise in the Zaporizhzhia region – “Mineral”. And together with it – two factories: a beer factory and a milk factory.
Before the war, about three dozen Berdyansk enterprises, including large industrial ones, belonged to People’s Deputy Oleksandr Ponomaryov. On October 31, his enterprises were taken over by the occupation authorities. Among them is the largest producer of agricultural machinery “Berdyanski zatky”.