Ukraine’s Bureau of Economic Security has dismantled a ring smuggling more than 1,000 cubic metres of grey wood through Moldova into the European Union, with detectives recovering ₴10 million in seized round logs, cash and falsified paperwork in 26 coordinated raids on woodworking enterprises, warehouses, vehicles and the homes of those involved.
That is according to the Office of the Prosecutor General, with the case worked jointly by detectives from the Bureau of Economic Security, the National Police and the Security Service of Ukraine under procedural leadership from the Chernivtsi Regional Prosecutor’s Office.
Wood Central understands that the Chernivtsi region, known historically as Northern Bukovyna, sits on Ukraine’s southwestern frontier with Romania and Moldova and is one of the country’s traditional Carpathian timber-producing zones, and that the BES detectives recovered forged shipping documents, marking tags, mobile phones, dashcams, and rough notes alongside the timber and cash holdings.
The Office of the Prosecutor General said the ring’s organiser, identified as the head of a private enterprise, purchased unaccounted timber across 2024 and 2025, registered the consignments under forged documents of origin and cleared the export documentation needed to push round logs across the Moldovan border. Entrepreneurs, forestry workers and drivers were drawn into the operation to move the illegally harvested timber along the logistics chain to the frontier.
The Bureau of Economic Security press service said its detectives had also identified officials inside the regional forestry administration as participants in the scheme. The Bukovyna case follows Wood Central’s coverage last week of a Forests of Ukraine forester charged over a national park logging racket, the latest in a string of cases drawing state forestry workers into criminal proceedings.
“According to the investigation, during 2025, the organiser and his accomplices purchased unaccounted timber. Officials of the forestry administration were involved in the illicit activity,” the Bureau of Economic Security press service said.
Across the 26 searches executed on 22 April, detectives seized about 1,000 cubic metres of round logs, along with shipping documents and identification tags, with cash holdings totalling €48,360, $4,500, and ₴509,400 also confiscated. The total value of the seized items reached approximately ₴10 million, the Chernivtsi Regional Prosecutor’s Office said.
Round logs stacked at one of the Chernivtsi-region woodworking premises searched on 22 April, with the Office of the Prosecutor General saying the racket registered consignments of this type under forged documents of origin and cleared the export documentation needed to push the timber across the Moldovan frontier under cover of certified paperwork. (Photo Credit: Office of the Prosecutor General of Ukraine / supplied)
Two heads of private enterprises operating in the forestry and wood processing sector have been served with notices of suspicion under Part 2 of Article 201-1 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine, with all participants in the scheme still being identified and the pre-trial investigation continuing.
The Bukovyna operation is the latest case in the Bureau of Economic Security’s ongoing programme to de-shadow Ukraine’s forestry sector, the institutional language the agency uses to push back against grey wood smuggling networks operating across the country’s western and southern borders with European Union neighbours.
The Bukovyna raids run within the broader Zelenskyy government enforcement programme, Wood Central reported in mid-2024, when Kyiv unveiled a blockchain-style timber accounting system requiring photographic documentation at every stage of felling, haulage, and value-chain transfer to choke off the grey wood trade ahead of European market scrutiny. To learn more about that crackdown, click here for Wood Central’s coverage of the Zelenskyy decree.
