US charges Hong Kong based-Russian with smuggling military technology to Russia, 18 September 2023

A Russian man who has lived in Hong Kong has been taken into U.S. custody and charged with smuggling large quantities of American-made, military-grade microelectronics to Russia, the U.S. Department of Justice said...

Maxim Marchenko, 51, and two unnamed Russian co-conspirators were accused of using his shell companies to conceal the fraudulent procurement of so-called OLED micro-displays.

The case was coordinated through the Justice Department's Task Force KleptoCapture, which was created to enforce sanctions, export restrictions and other measures in response to Russia's invasion of Ukraine.

According to federal prosecutors in Manhattan, OLED micro-displays can be used in rifle scopes, night-vision goggles, thermal optics and other weapons systems.

Prosecutors said Marchenko and his co-conspirators falsely represented that the dual-use technology - meaning it had civilian and military applications - was being sent to China, Hong Kong and elsewhere for use in electron microscopes for medical research.

They also said Marchenko's shell companies funneled more than $1.6 million to the U.S. to support the scheme, which ran from May 2022 to August 2023...

Assistant Attorney General Matthew Olsen of the Justice Department's national security division said the case "reinforces the department's commitment to protect U.S. security and counter Russian aggression in Ukraine through the vigorous enforcement of our export control and sanctions laws."

Marchenko was charged with seven criminal counts including wire fraud, smuggling, money laundering and four conspiracy counts, and could if convicted face several decades in prison...

The case is U.S. v. Marchenko, U.S. District Court, Southern District of New York, No. 23-mj-06181.