Thread by @ChrisO_wiki

1/ The Russian authorities are widening their investigations into the bombing of the Kerch Bridge to Crimea on 8 October, according to the Russian news outlet Vlasti. More suspects have been arrested and may face up to life imprisonment if convicted. 🧵 follows.

2/ Vlasti reports that five men have been taken to Simferopol for detention. In an apparent threat to their lawyers, it comments: "Their defenders were warned ... that if you are too active, you may receive a summons from the military enlistment office."

3/ The five are brothers Artyom Azatyan and Georgy Azatyan, associated with their family's agricultural logistics business in Armavir, Krasnoyarsk Krai; Roman Solomko and Vladimir Zloba, both Ukrainian citizens; and Artur Terchanyan, an Armenian truck driver.

4/ They are all accused of involvement in the shipping of the truck cargo that exploded on the Kerch Bridge. Solomko and Zloba were reportedly involved with organising the shipment from Georgia, to where it had been shipped from Bulgaria. Terchanyan drove it to Armavir.

5/ According to his son, who believes his father was set up, Solomko went to Georgia, paid the money and customs dues for the cargo, dealt with the customs declaration, hired a broker and returned to Russia.

6/ "He had to leave the money there, we left our documents from the firms officially... We filed everything officially, we took it all to our firm officially."

The Azatyans' company Agro-Business is also under suspicion for possible violations of tax laws.

7/ Vlasti comments that "the company clearly has a higher turnover than on paper, and trucks are travelling more frequently than is indicated in the documentation."

8/ Three more people have been detained in Moscow in relation to the attack. They are:

🔺 Alexander Gennadievich Bylin, who is associated with the company that was supposed to receive the cargo in the Crimea.

9/ 🔺 Dmitry Viktorovich Tyazhelykh, an entrepreneur specialising in repair.

🔺 Oleg Alexandrovich Antipov, owner of the Ulyanovsk-based company TEK-34, which advertised the cargo online and assigned the delivery contract to the driver in whose truck it exploded.

10/ However, Vlasti notes: "a clear link between those arrested on suspicion of the terrorist attack and the bombing itself has not emerged."

11/ "Despite statements [by the authorities] that the ideologists, beneficiaries, organizers and perpetrators … have been identified by investigative means, there is not a single word about this in the case materials that were announced in court …

12/ "All the key points and personalities are 'unidentified'. From what has been found in Agro-Business's documents, so far it is at most a case of tax law violations." /end

13/ Sources:
🔹 vlasti.info/news/50793-sud…
🔹 vlasti.info/news/50852-pod…
🔹 vlasti.info/news/50866-syn…
🔹 vlasti.info/news/50901-sta…
🔹 vlasti.info/news/50909-bas…
🔹 vlasti.info/news/50949-spi…

(More here on how Russia claims the men were involved.)

https://twitter.com/ChrisO_wiki/status/1580303839248322560?s=19