Deputy head of Russian nuclear weapons developer owns stake in Czech factory

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The sanctioned Russian Federal Nuclear Center (RFNC) is responsible for developing more than half of the Kremlin’s nuclear arsenal. Nevertheless, RFNC deputy director Alexander Petrov owns a 43% stake in the Czech factory Roboterm. The plant, based in the town of Chotěboř, produces induction heaters for metal processing, and until 2022, Russia’s truck manufacturer KamAZ was one of its biggest customers. Today, Petrov’s Russian company Reltec supplies similar equipment to manufacturers of Iskander and Topol-M missiles, as well as to a nuclear weapons developer. An investigation by The Insider in cooperation with Investigace.cz can now reveal all of the details.

How a former regional minister became a Czech entrepreneur

Born in 1961, Alexander Yuryevich Petrov worked for more than two decades in research and industrial production. From 1997 to 2009, he served as general director of Reltec in Yekaterinburg. From 2009 to 2014, he served as Minister of Industry and Science and as deputy head of the Sverdlovsk regional government. Since 2016, Petrov has chaired the Committee for Foundry and Forging Production of the Association of Defense Industry Enterprises.

From 2018 to at least 2023, Petrov was deputy director of a branch of the All-Russian Electrotechnical Institute (VEI) at the All-Russian Scientific Research Institute of Technical Physics (VNIITF) — one of Russia’s two primary nuclear weapons development centers. The institute is located in Snezhinsk in the Chelyabinsk Region, and is part of the Rosatom State Corporation.

Throughout his service in the regional government and the defense enterprise, Petrov combined public service with private business — not without benefit to himself. Since 1993, he has been co-founder and general director of UPI-Rezonans, which in 2016 was restructured into Reltec LLC. Since June 2008, Petrov has been director and owner of a 25% stake in Reltec Plant LLC. Another 25% belongs to Elena Viktorovna Petrova, whose phone number is listed as Alexander Petrov’s contact at Alfa-Bank. Since 2010, Petrov has also owned 100 percent of the charter capital of Energomash Plant LLC, valued at 6.87 million rubles. The company ceased operations in 2024.

Reltec’s core specialization is the development and production of induction heating systems used in forging, hardening, and thermal treatment of metals — dual-use technologies applicable to manufacturing components for rockets, artillery barrels, and armored vehicle parts. In 2005, Petrov gained access to modern European technologies by acquiring a 43% stake in the Czech plant Roboterm in Chotěboř. Since June 2005, Alexander Petrov has directly owned a 43% share in RT s.r.o., the sole beneficiary of Roboterm s.r.o.

A partnership to bypass sanctions

In mid-2013, at a Czech-Russian conference in Yekaterinburg, an agreement was signed between Russian company Reltec Yekaterinburg Ltd. and Czech firms Šmeral Brno and Roboterm Chotěboř. Under the arrangement,Roboterm and Reltec would supply induction heaters for molding machines manufactured by Šmeral. The goal of the joint venture was to expand Czech access to the Russian market, focusing on supplies to state enterprises and other Russian companies that enjoyed a close commercial relationship with the Russian government.

Then, in early 2014, Russia carried out its illegal annexation of Ukraine’s Crimean peninsula, which was followed by Moscow’s sponsorship of a “separatist” war in the eastern Donbas region. In response, Western countries imposed a range of sanctions that severely limited the supply of technology to Russian defense companies. In October 2014, “former vice premier of the Sverdlovsk region” Alexander Petrov — in fact, the chairman of the board of directors of Reltec — explained in an interview that joint ventures like the one between his company and its Czech partners had effectively become a tool for sanctions evasion:

“There are certain restrictions on the supply of high-tech equipment to Russia. From the Russian side, we are certainly interested in bringing in new technologies [as] our plants use relatively outdated equipment. Today, creating joint ventures is the only way to introduce the latest Western technologies to the Russian market, and at the same time the safest technological route. This is especially important for defense and strategic enterprises.”

Petrov’s companies in Russia and the Czech Republic worked in two directions. Roboterm had an active contract to supply equipment to AvtoVAZ and KamAZ, while one of Petrov’s Russian enterprises supplied equipment to Lom Praha, a Czech company certified to repair Russian helicopters in NATO and EU countries. The equipment in question was used for turbine blade processing, and there were plans to supply equipment for helicopter engine production as well.

Petrov sought to persuade Czech politicians that sanctions were unreasonable, as they prevented Russian truck manufacturers from obtaining parts from a Czech company’s subsidiary. He made some inroads, with then-president Miloš Zeman publicly stating at the 2017 Czech-Russian summit in the Urals that “sanctions are not benefiting the European Union and should be ended.” Czech Minister of Industry and Trade Jiří Havlíček also showed interest in expanding business with Russia, noting that trade turnover with the Sverdlovsk region had grown by 45% in the first eight months of 2017 compared to the same period the previous year.

Even after Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Reltec's press service continued to report on the company’s supply of imported components to the Russian military-industrial complex. In 2023, Reltec delivered a vacuum testing unit to an unnamed federal defense enterprise. According to the project description, “to achieve the objective, the best equipment available on the market was selected, and some key components were obtained through parallel imports.”

How Reltec supplies Russian missile and nuclear weapons manufacturers

The Reltec plant traces its origins to a mechanical factory that was evacuated to the Urals from near Kyiv in 1941 amid Nazi Germany’s invasion of the Soviet Union. Today, its products are used in missile production — the same missiles the Russian army uses to strike Ukraine. Reltec is listed in the closed register of defense enterprises maintained by the Ministry of Industry and Trade and published by the investigative outlet Dossier Center.

In 2018, shortly after Petrov became deputy director of the All-Russian Electrotechnical Institute, his company won a 20 million ruble contract with the All-Russian Scientific Research Institute Of Technical Physics, the Electrotechnical Institute’s parent organization. Beyond Petrov’s own ties, two indirect signs point to potential corruption in the procurement. The contract with the All-Russian Scientific Research Institute Of Technical Physics — for the supply of components and parts for induction melting electrical equipment — was signed on June 7, 2018. Petrov’s company was specifically named in the technical specifications attached to the government procurement notice published on June 1, 2018. Although three potential suppliers were listed in the institute’s request, Reltec was the only one that submitted a bid.

From Reltec's news releases, it is possible to compile a detailed list of defense plants that have purchased the company’s induction equipment. In 1998, the firm developed and installed a two-ton furnace for OJSC Salut — formerly the Kuibyshev Mechanical Plant. In addition to armor plate production, the plant also manufactures rocket engines. In the 1960s, it produced components for the Soviet lunar rocket program and, since 2004, has been part of the Tactical Missiles Corporation.

After Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Reltec supplied induction systems to more than half a dozen defense enterprises. In 2023, the company’s specialists commissioned a melting installation at KEMZ Concern in Kizlyar, Dagestan. Aside from civilian products, the plant also develops proximity fuzes for artillery shells.

That same year, Reltec supplied equipment to two enterprises owned by the Roscosmos space corporation: the Votkinsk Plant and Proton-PM. Votkinsk, which produces missiles for the Iskander-M complex, as well Topol-M intercontinental ballistic missiles, received two melting units.

In 2024, Reltec delivered an induction heating system for pipe heat treatment to a subsidiary of the Almaz-Antey Air and Space Defense Concern, the Nizhny Novgorod Plant named in honor of the 70th Anniversary of Victory [over Nazi Germany]. According to the description, the system is designed to “preheat pipe billets with wall thicknesses up to 70 mm and diameters up to 1,200 mm before welding” and to perform “thermal treatment of welded seams up to 750°C,” suggesting it may be used to produce missile bodies.

In 2024, Reltec also “promptly eliminated the consequences of an emergency situation in the power supply system of an induction melting installation” at UOMZ JSC, which manufactures optical-location systems for combat aircraft and helicopters.

Euros are euros

As The Insider previously reported, Czech-made Meopta sights, Sellier & Bellot ammunition, and Česká Zbrojovka rifles continued to reach Russia between 2022 and 2024 through the distributor Alliance, which had also represented these brands before the full-scale invasion. The difference was that before 2022, Alliance imported Czech products directly, whereas after the war began, rifles, scopes, and ammunition were routed through Turkey and Kazakhstan.

The Czech engineering firms Alta Invest, Kovosvit, Labara, PTV, TOS Varnsdorf, and Tachtech, which operated in the Russian market through subsidiaries before the invasion, were also confirmed to have continued doing so even after February 2022.