From: Euromaiden Press
Article by: Yulia Poluhina
The key players in the Donbas’ booming smuggling business are politicians, oligarchs, and the criminal underworld. Coal, gold, gasoline, and cigarettes are the main resources the separatists are fighting for in eastern Ukraine, an investigative report by Novaya Gazeta finds. What follows is an English-language overview of the report, summarized and translated for length and clarity by Vera Zimmerman..
Omitting geopolitics, propaganda, and the reality of war, Novaya Gazeta conducted a detailed investigation into how smuggling in the Donbas works and who benefits from it. Following the money along the demarcation line and across Russian-Ukrainian border through a network of kingpins, oligarchs, and politicians is central to understanding how this business works.
In her report, Yulia Poluhina, a journalist of Novaya Gazeta, discovers that the separatists’ motivation to continue the conflict is so they can easily smuggle energy resources and goods. Her investigation reveals the connections among the local elite, oligarchs, and politicians in Russia and Ukraine. It also shows the internal power struggle among them.
