US Charges Seven in Plot to Buy Chips for Putin’s War Machine
- Venezuelan oil sales paid for black market scheme, FBI says
- US heightens efforts to deny Putin technology for war machine
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The Justice Department accused seven people of evading US sanctions as part of a purported plot to sell Venezuelan oil to Russia and China and use the proceeds to buy black market chips for Russia to install in high-tech weapons on the battlefields in Ukraine.
The five Russians and two Venezuelans, “knowingly sought to conceal the theft of US military technology and profit off black market oil,” FBI Assistant Director in Charge Michael Driscoll said in announcing the charges in New York on Wednesday.