A Belarusian state fertilizer company under European Union sanctions has found a way around the export ban by leasing its production lines to intermediary firms that pose as manufacturers, according to an investigation by the Belarusian Investigative Center (BIC).
Some fertilizer produced by the sanctioned enterprise is shipped into the EU through Latvia using documentation that obscures its true origin. A leaked government document obtained by BIC confirms the government’s role in setting up the scheme to help the fertilizer company in “overcoming sanctions.”
According to the leaked document, the government-backed scheme involves “special exporters,” which lease production facilities from the sanctioned state enterprize, Grodno Azot Joint Stock Company. The exporters are then able to claim they are the manufacturers of the fertilizer, which was actually produced by Grodno Azot.
The EU sanctioned Grodno Azot in 2021 “for the repression of civil society” following a crackdown on workers who went on strike as part of nationwide protests against the autocratic regime of Belarus President Alexander Lukashenko.
While the sanctions ban member states from importing fertilizer manufactured by Grodno Azot, the company has consistently managed to send its products to the EU regardless.
Lithuanian authorities moved to block imports in 2023 after an investigation by OCCRP member centers BIC and Siena showed that Grodno Azot fertilizer was entering the country over its eastern border with Belarus. Cargo documents falsely listed the producer as a different company.
In 2024, RFE/RL reported that Grodno Azot used a network of intermediary companies to send fertilizer to Ukraine via EU member states. The fertilizer was falsely claimed to have been manufactured in Turkmenistan.
This March, Poland sanctioned a Belarusian company called MetaTradingProm LLC after authorities discovered it had been exporting Grodno Azot fertilizer under its own name. That followed sanctions imposed by Poland in December 2024 against three different Belarusian companies, including one called Technospetstrading LLC.
Now, BIC has uncovered documentation that MetaTradingProm, Technospetstrading and other Belarusian companies have been shipping Grodno Azot fertilizer into Latvia. The scheme has gotten slightly more complicated — and therefore harder to detect — as the shipments to Latvia now involve a second intermediary company, BIC reports.
Meanwhile, a leaked internal report to the Belarusian Council of Ministers provides insight into the government’s role in the scheme.
“In order to mitigate the impact of EU and US sanctions imposed against Grodno Azot and to return to premium markets of EU countries, an institution of special exporters (economic entities of the Republic of Belarus) was created,” the report states.
The leaked document further clarifies that “the main financial and economic objective of the new manufacturer [is] overcoming sanctions and ensuring maximum profit.”
Before sanctions, more than 70 percent of Grodno Azot’s exports went to the EU, according to an internal company document obtained by Rabochy Rukh ("Workers Movement"), a group of activists opposing the Lukashenko regime.
By 2024, after a couple years of sanctions, exports into the EU had fallen, but were still significant. Some 44 percent of Grodno Azot’s exports went to the EU that year, and were worth about $59 million, according to the company document.
Trade data from the EU statistics agency, Eurostat, shows that rail shipments of Belarusian fertilizers to Latvia stopped after sanctions were imposed in 2021. However, shipments began arriving again in January this year, according to Eurostat data.
A leaked Belarusian rail shipment document obtained by Rabochy Rukh indicates that at least 278 rail cars carrying fertilizer have crossed into Latvia so far this year. As a major producer, at least some of that fertilizer is likely to have originated with Grodno Azot. But invoices show that the cargoes were listed as coming from different companies.
Two invoices record fertilizer shipments from MetaTradingProm in February and March, which were headed via Estonia to Latvia and Germany. Another invoice shows a shipment sent by Technospetstrading to Hungary via Latvia.