On May 14, Russian citizen Oleg Patsulya and his business partner were arrested in the United States for selling sanctioned aircraft parts to Russian airlines, according to the New York Times.
According to the investigation, in 2022 he sent a letter to one of the Russian air carriers with a proposal for a scheme to circumvent the imposed restrictions. He promised a "solution to pressing problems" "in the light of the sanctions imposed on the Russian Federation."
The Russians reportedly began developing their system to circumvent sanctions in May 2022. Subsequently, they placed orders for expensive braking systems for Boeing 737 aircraft for at least three Russian airlines.
Patsulya and his business partner were detained in a room rented by their company in the Trump Tower III skyscraper in Miami on the 41st floor of the building.
According to the NYT, in addition to Patsuli, sanctions on Russian air carriers are many other intermediaries. This is evidenced by the data of the Import Genius aggregator. In total, from the beginning of the war until December 2022, several thousand aircraft parts worth $14.4 million were sent to Russia. This includes deliveries of parts for Boeing aircraft worth $8.9 million.
Through the United Arab Emirates, the Maldives, Turkey and China, they were sent to Russia, although there are precedents for sending such spare parts directly from the United States. They were received by such airlines as Rossiya, Aeroflot, S7 Airlines, Pobeda, Ural Airlines and Utair.
Earlier it became known that Aeroflot ordered its employees to fix malfunctions in the aircraft cabins less frequently due to a lack of parts. As a result, aircraft can fly with serious damage.
On March 15 , the head of the airworthiness maintenance department, Valery Kudinov, was fired from the Federal Air Transport Agency. This happened after he told reporters about the process of transferring Russian aircraft to the state register and China's refusal to supply aircraft parts to the Russian Federation.