Motor Sich plant supplying Russian army, report says

The Snizhne Machinery Plant, the turbine bladeproducer of Motor Sich (MSICH UK) located in the Donbas war zone, is currently working in three-shift mode to supply its products directly to Russian aviation plants, the zn.uanews site reported on Sept. 14, citing undisclosed sources. Raw materials for the blades are also still being supplied from Motor Sich’s main plant in Zaporizhia, according to the source. Some unique equipment has been transferred from the plant to Russia, the report said.

Alexander Paraschiy: Since the Snizhne Plant is located in the corner of the Donbas region occupied by the Russian-terrorist army, it’s natural that the Russians are using it to supply their military needs. The exposure of such operations, if confirmed, will hurt the prospects of parent Motor Sich, which is not supposed to be cooperating with official Russian military plants, not with Russian occupying forces in Ukraine. The company has been criticized for such cooperation many times in the last couple of months, and a real threat remains that the Ukrainian government will halt all exports of its aerospace engines to Russia.

Despite the clear violation of national interests, Motor Sich had little choice in its situation in order to survive. The Snizhne plant can be easily transferredto Russian territory to create a narrow bottleneck in Motor Sich’s production cycle and lead to huge losses. Cooperation, therefore, may have been a forced decision to try saving some assets in the war-torn area.