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Dutch companies sanctioned for assisting in construction of Russian bridge in Crimea

1 min read
October 13, 2023

Four Dutch companies have been fined and eight people were given community service for participating in the construction of Russia’s bridge in Crimea.

Russia Crimea bridge
The bridge Russia built to connect mainland Russia with Crimea | © Natalia Garmasheva

Four Dutch companies have been sanctioned for assisting in the construction of Russia’s Crimean Bridge, the Netherlands’s Public Prosecution Office announced today.

The European Union sanctioned the sale of goods and services for any person or any use in Crimea in 2014, following its condemnation of Russia’s annexation of Crimea.

The Public Prosecution Office started an investigation into the matter in 2017, and released their findings today, showing “that Dutch companies and individuals have developed and supplied goods for the construction of the Crimean Bridge, such as (parts of) pile hammers, vibratory hammers and power packs. Furthermore, technical assistance was provided in the context of these deliveries both in the Netherlands and on-site.

According to the announcement, the cases have been settled extrajudicially. The companies have paid fines totalling 160,000 euros (168,000 dollars) and eight people have been given community service ranging from 20 to 60 hours.

One of the companies has also had 71,330 euros confiscated for providing the prohibited goods and services to Russia.

The assistance of Dutch companies in the Russian project was first revealed by the Dutch newspaper Gelderlander in 2017. They found that Dematec Equipment and Biljard Hydrauliek both assisted in building and providing Russia with a piling hammer, respectively, to drill holes to insert the foundational pillars of the bridge.

Dematec director, Derk van den Heuvel, told Gelderlander in 2017 that their business with Russia was legal because all work was undertaken in “undisputed Russian territory,” meaning within the Russian mainland. Director Marcel Bijlard of Bijlard Hydrauliek, on the other hand, said that he was not aware the equipment would be used for the Crimea Bridge, as it was delivered to a customer in the Netherlands.

The bridge was built from 2014 to 2017 between the Black Sea and the Sea of Azov to connect the Crimean Peninsula to Russia after Russia forcibly occupied it in early 2014.

The Crimean Peninsula is connected to mainland Ukraine, and not to mainland Russia, so Vladimir Putin announced in 2014 that a bridge would be built to connect Crimea to mainland Russia. It is the longest bridge in Europe.

The bridge has since become a strategic part of the Russia-Ukraine conflict and crucial for the Russian supply line.

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Alexander Saraff Marcos

Alexander is a writer for Newsendip.
He is a dual citizen of the United States and Spain and lives between Spain and France. He graduated from the University of Pittsburgh with a major in philosophy and a minor in French. He loves watching e-sport on his spare time.