The Finnish company HD-Parts has exported truck parts worth millions of euros to Russia since the beginning of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

According to Yle’s investigation, the company sent mainly spare parts for Swedish Volvo and Scania trucks to Russia.

At the same time, the management of HD-Parts denies the violation of sanction rules.

Lasse Lindqvist, the founder and chairman of the HD-Parts board, said that customs inspected and approved each shipment to Russia. He stated that he had all the necessary documents.

Lindqvist simultaneously confirms that at least 3/4 of HD-Parts' turnover is accounted for by Russian exports.

The Finnish customs do not comment on the situation with HD-Parts but clarify that they conduct checks when products that may be subject to sanctions are indicated in the export declaration.

The journalists checked the list of spare parts supplied to the Russian Federation by HD-Parts and concluded that the names of the HD-Parts’ batches largely correspond to goods prohibited for import into Russia.

Russian customs data show that trucks were also exported from Finland to Russia. In particular, about a dozen second-hand Scania and Volvo trucks, as well as semi-trailers of other brands, ended up in Russia during the war.

Customs data indicate that they were owned by Idän Liikenteenvälittys IL from Lappeenranta. The cost of supplies was hundreds of thousands of euros.

At the beginning of November, it became known that the trial of a woman accused of purchasing small arms ammunition components inside the country and smuggling them to Russia was about to begin in Finland.

Apart from that, Finland seized the real estate of Russian businessman Boris Aleshin, who is on the EU sanctions list and is connected to the Russian defence industry.