WikiIran exposes thousands of confidential documents leaked recently online from the internal servers of Iran’s largest petrochemical company “The Persian Gulf Petrochemical Industry Commercial Company (PGPICC).” The information highlighted here expose how this company has been circumventing the international sanctions against Iran’s petrochemical industry. WikiIran continues to extract the most incriminating materials, now revealing how the company is strengthening the connections to Russia.

The documents prove that PGPICC has maintained frequent and continues financial connections with Russian import and export companies. The materials prove that the relationship became tighter in 2022, possibly due to the implication of sanctions on Russia, as a result of the invasion to Ukraine.

According to media reports, bilateral trade turnover between Iran and Russia rose by 45% in the first half of 2022, to 2.8$ billion. During this year, Iranian and Russian ministers held official meetings in which they discussed stepping up economic cooperation and particularly supplying each other with oil, gas and petrochemical products.

In its early days, the relationship between PGPICC and its Russian counterparts was based mostly on visits of the company's delegations to trade shows and professional petrochemical industry exhibitions in Russia. Later on, the Russian companies' representatives also visited the factories and plants of PGPIC's subsidiaries.

The leaked materials reveal that at least four Russian companies were conducting business with PGPICC:

1. LLC ForPlast – Russian company Forplast Chemical is based in the city of Perm in south-east Russia. It is a manufacturer and exporter of polyethylene wax and is shipping its products across the world. The company was founded in 2014, has ~15 employees and managed by CEO Roman Chuklinov.

2. MTM Ltd – While it is officially a Russian company based in Moscow, the company has characteristics of a classic Iranian front company: It is operating a generic petrochemical industry website (like many of the other front companies of PGPICC, exposed on WikIran) and has employees with Iranian names and appearances.

3. LLC Inzhtrast – Russian company based in Moscow, managed by CEO Aleksei Dumnov.

4. Beliy Dom JVE LLP – No further information available.

The shipping control table also reveals that two of PGPICC's front companies, M and D International Trade and VIP Resource Limited, both had accounts in the Russian Alfa Bank. The Iranian exchange house working with those front companies is Khatam Almovahedin Financial Group, managed by Mohammad Hassan Abtahi.

Today, in light of the severe sanctions imposed on both Russia and Iran, and the obstacles that face Russian companies as they seek to transfer money in and out of the country, it is expected that additional Iranian exchange houses will work to establish infrastructures of front companies in Russia.