KAZAN. April 16 (Interfax-AVN) - The prosecutor's office of Russia's internal republic of Tatarstan has opened a criminal case against Alexander Talov, director general of the local Vertolyoty Mi research and production enterprise, on charges of illegal entrepreneurship in the military-technical cooperation sphere.
Talov is suspected of being engaged in entrepreneurship without a proper license and getting extra high profits from it, a source in the prosecutor's office told Interfax-Military News Agency on Wednesday. He is held responsible for signing an illegal contract with the Turkish Gendarmerie for repairs and modernization of about 20 MI-17 Hip helicopters, including 15 transport and combat ones.
"The deal belongs to the military-technical cooperation sphere. Under the law on military-technical cooperation, the enterprise had no right to conclude it, because it had no license for this type of activity. Moreover, the contract had a dumping value, which is much lower than the minimal value determined by the Russian Committee for Military-Technical Cooperation with Foreign Countries," the source said.
If found guilty, Talov may be sentenced to up to five years in prison.
The Turkish Gendarmerie held a competition for repairs and modernization of a batch of MI-17 helicopters last year. Vertolyoty Mi competed for the contract with Rosoboronexport, Russia's only enterprise authorized to export military helicopters, and enterprises from Ukraine, Belarus, Hungary and Kazakhstan.
As Vertolyoty Mi offered a very low price, Turkey signed the contract with this enterprise.