The general director of the main shipyard that builds vessels for Russia's Black Sea Fleet, important for Moscow's war effort against Ukraine, has been dismissed after less than eight months in the job.
Andrei Veselov will leave his post at Admiralty Shipyard in St. Petersburg in a move that follows his recent order for workers at the site to be put on idle time due to a decrease in production and a lack of funding, Vedemosti reported.
During the period of downtime at the company, workers are being paid two-thirds of their salary although it is uncertain whether this would continue into the New Year, the paper said.
Veselov had been appointed to the post only in April, but Russian business newspaper Vedemosti reported that his dismissal follows a decision by the board of directors of parent company United Shipbuilding Corporation (USC), which Newsweek has contacted for comment by email.
Founded in 1704 under Russian tsar Peter the Great, Admiralty Shipyard is the oldest shipbuilding enterprise in the country. It designs, produces and modernizes vessels. Lately, it received orders to produce two diesel-electric submarines, Vologda and Yaroslavl.
Western sanctions imposed on Russia following its full-scale invasion of Ukraine have forced the company to look for alternative equipment suppliers, The Moscow Times reported on Tuesday. It had to redesign orders for two fishing trawlers Captain Yunak and Mechanik Shcherbakov, which are worth 6.5 billion rubles each (about $720 million).
Sources close to USC management said it would "terminate the powers" of Veselov who must leave his post by the end of December, the newspaper said, without specifying the reason. But Vedemosti said there had been turbulence at the company due to the "difficult situation in the industry caused by sanctions and the dishonest behavior of foreign suppliers."
A former chief engineer at the site, Veselov was previously the shipyard's CEO. The previous general director, Alexander Buzakov, died suddenly on December 24, 2022. The day before he died, the site launched the Velikiye Luki submarine, a Lada-class vessel which is considered the most modern of Russia's non-nuclear submarines.
On October 9, Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a decree to transfer the state's stake in USC to VTB bank which, St. Petersburg news outlet Fontanka reported, meant that the bank "will have to cope with production issues and find a solution for the financial recovery of the company."
At least 19 Russian military vessels have been attacked in the Black Sea by Ukraine since February 2022, according to the Oryx open-source intelligence website. In November, Russia unveiled the K-564 Yasen-M class multipurpose submarine at the Sevmash shipyard in the northern Russian city of Severodvinsk.
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About the writer
Brendan Cole is a Newsweek Senior News Reporter based in London, UK. His focus is Russia and Ukraine, in particular ... Read more
