The government is trying to establish whether a multi-million-pound purchase of aircraft from Russia broke the UK’s sanctions regime, after being alerted to the matter by The Observer.
The Department for Business and Trade’s own figures show that the UK imported £80m in Russian goods in the year to June 2025, an increase of 21.2% on the previous year. Nearly half – £36.3m – came from spending on Russian aircraft.
The Observer understands this was a private transaction, although those involved have not yet been publicly identified. The listed product code relates to “aircraft & associated equipment; spacecraft”.
Officials were unable to confirm who had made the purchase or whether it was permissible under the UK’s sanctions regime, which bans the purchase of aviation goods and technology and “goods which generate significant revenues for Russia”.
A government spokesperson said: “Failing to comply with sanctions is an offence punishable through large financial penalties or even criminal prosecution, and we take reports of UK companies not complying with them very seriously. We encourage anyone who believes a company may have breached trade sanctions to report this to the Government.”
Last month, defence secretary John Healey said Russian president Vladimir Putin viewed Britain as his “No 1 enemy”.
This is thought to be the first time aircraft have been imported from Russia to the UK since sanctions were imposed as a result of the invasion of Ukraine, although in February it emerged that British firms were among those to have exported aircraft parts to India that reached Russia.
However Calum Miller, foreign affairs spokesman for the Liberal Democrats, said: “The British public will be appalled that the UK is continuing to fill Putin’s war chest.
“There are serious security concerns and questions about what imported Russian planes are doing in Britain, why so much more is now being spent on them, and whether this trade undermines the sanctions in place to strangle the Kremlin’s coffers.”
Next week the Lib Dems plan to table a new bill in Parliament enabling ministers to seize the estimated £25bn held in frozen Russian assets across the UK, with the intention of redeploying the funds to support Ukraine.
Photograph by Raid Necati Aslm/Anadolu via Getty Images