Europe closes doors for Alutech
A major distributor of Alutech goods in the Czech Republic and Slovakia said it stopped selling Belarusian products due to sanctions.
"Because of sanctions we cannot sell perfect Alutech doors. Thank you for being with us. We hope that the sanctions will end soon", the Slovak distributor CFU s.r.o., which operates on the market under the brand Alutechdoors.sk, wrote on its social media earlier this week.
Screenshot of a post by Alutech’s distributor. Source: Instagram account @alutechdoors_sk_cz
In March this year, Buro, together with journalists from the German publications Paper Trail Media and Manager Magazin, published an investigation into how the large industrial holding company Alutech supplied Belarusian panels, doors, gates and steel goods to Europe in order to circumvent sanctions. The total value of the deliveries amounted to more than $5 million.
Three months ago, our colleagues from Investigace.cz continued this topic and reported in detail about the Alutech logistics centre in the Czech Republic, through which Belarusian sanctioned products were distributed in the EU. The Czech investigators found out that Alutech garage doors were still being offered by distributors on both the Czech and Slovak markets.
Moreover, the sellers did not hide the fact that the goods were produced in Belarus and imported into the EU. A representative of Alutechdoors.sk said that a truck from Belarus arrived in Europe every 3-4 weeks. Now he explained why he stopped selling Belarusian products.
"I will have to dismiss most of my employees. The same fate will befall other distributors, as there is currently no way to deliver Belarusian doors to Europe. At the same time, customers were satisfied with the quality of the products and deliveries went smoothly. European dealers, not Belarus or Russia, suffer most from sanctions", the sales director of the distribution company told Investigace.cz.
He added that he approached the European Commission with a request for sanctions relief, but he was told it was impossible.
Paper Trail Media also contacted Alutech's distributors in Germany. They said they had stopped selling Belarusian products. One of the companies said it had stopped selling steel doors under the Alutech brand in the spring. Meanwhile, the German prosecutors have dropped the case against the industrial holding for lack of evidence.