In the United States, Italian national Manfred Gruber pleaded guilty to conspiracy to violate export control regulations. Gruber, using front companies, exported more than $540,000 worth of ammunition from the United States to Kyrgyzstan, from where most of it ended up in Russia.
““Manfred Gruber put many lives at risk by illegally supplying Russia with hundreds of thousands of dollars’ worth of American-made, military-grade ammunition to advance its war in Ukraine,” said Assistant Director Roman Rozhavsky of the FBI’s Counterintelligence and Espionage Division.
According to court filings, Gruber was the sales director of an Italian company, a major wholesale distributor of firearms and ammunition. He participated in a scheme to supply ammunition to Kyrgyzstan, although their re-export was prohibited.
In January 2026, Sergei Zharnovnikov, an accomplice of the accused living in Kyrgyzstan, was sentenced to 39 months in prison after pleading guilty to violating the Export Control Reform Act.
