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Barred From U.N. Work, Russian Contractors Are Back, Airdropping Aid in Syria

A street in Deir al-Zour, a government-controlled town in Syria, in 2013. Since April, an Abakan Air plane has been parachuting food into Deir al-Zour, the only besieged Syrian town that gets such airdrops.Credit...Reuters

UNITED NATIONS — Amid the diplomatic storm over the Syria war, the United Nations has paid millions of dollars to the owners of a private Russian airline company who were barred from doing business with the organization 10 years ago over bribery charges.

Their Moscow-based company, Abakan Air, is the only authorized civilian provider of airdropped humanitarian aid in the conflict. And the sole place it flies in Syria is over a government-held town that has no other way to receive food.

The owners, Nikolai Ustimenko and his son Pavel Ustimenko, were entangled in a financial scandal with the United Nations nearly 10 years ago, when an internal inquiry recommended no further dealings with them.

The story of how the Ustimenkos came to be the providers of the only airdropped humanitarian relief service in Syria is a mix of politics, profit motive and United Nations bureaucracy.

It offers a window into the way Syrian officials and their Russian allies have used the aid machinery of the United Nations, even as the organization’s top officials have accused Syria’s government of breaking international humanitarian law.

Syria’s government has blocked United Nations aid convoys from delivering food and medicine to besieged rebel-held cities across the country, in a breach of international humanitarian law. It has allowed Abakan Air, which has a contract with the World Food Program, a United Nations organization, to airdrop food to 110,000 people in Deir al-Zour, a government-controlled town besieged by the Islamic State. It is the only besieged town that gets humanitarian airdrops.

The World Food Program said that it had sought competitive bids for the job and that Abakan emerged as the sole bidder.

“Only Abakan indicated their readiness and capability to perform this specialized operation,” Abeer Etefa, a spokeswoman for the World Food Program, said in an email. “Other operators/brokers had cited lack of experience in high-altitude airdrops and/or security concerns for declining to operate into Syria.”

Ms. Etefa added that the company had been working with the United Nations in South Sudan and had passed the organization’s safety evaluation and “due diligence checks for operations” there. She did not comment on how the company could have passed those internal checks when its owners had been implicated in a financial scandal with the United Nations.

A spokesman for the United Nations, Stéphane Dujarric, said Thursday the company “did not disclose any association with a company or individual prohibited from being engaged in procurement,” as it is required to. “The case will be brought forward to the Vendor Review Committee for deliberation,” Mr. Dujarric added.

Nikolai and Pavel Ustimenko were named in a multimillion-dollar kickback scheme at the United Nations in 2007. At that time, an internal United Nations investigation concluded that they had “engaged in criminal acts, including bribery, corruption and money laundering.” Through another company, Avicos, they were selling aviation insurance to airlines that contracted with the United Nations.

Russian companies are well known for securing aviation contracts with the United Nations. But the case of Abakan Air in Syria is unusual because Russia is a combatant in a conflict that the United Nations has tried and failed to end.

Critics say that while the United Nations has to be pragmatic in using companies that agree to operate in dangerous war zones, the use of a Russian company to feed people in a government-held town can fuel the suspicions of those who already regard the United Nations as an ineffective intermediary in the conflict.

“We already know aid is being provided based on people’s perceived political affiliation,” said Widney Brown, program director for Physicians for Human Rights, which has been an outspoken critic of Russian and Syrian bombings of hospitals. “Then if aid is being delivered by a party to the conflict, it reinforces the perception — and the reality — that the delivery of aid is highly politicized.”

According to the United Nations’ latest estimate, more than 800,000 Syrians live in what it considers to be besieged areas; activists say the number is higher. Most of those people live in rebel-controlled areas besieged by government soldiers and pro-government militia members. Deir al-Zour is unusual: It is held by Syrian forces but surrounded by members of the Islamic State.

Since April, an Abakan cargo plane has been regularly parachuting 20-ton pallets of food into Deir al-Zour: chickpeas, salt, bulgur, rice, oil. Airdrops are very expensive. The United Nations has spent more than $34 million so far for the drops, which cost about $250,000 each.

Put another way, the United States, the biggest donor to the World Food Program, is paying a Russian airline company to save people living in a town controlled by President Bashar al-Assad of Syria, whom American officials blame for the war.

Western diplomats have unsuccessfully pressed the United Nations to carry out airdrops for rebel-held towns as well. United Nations officials have responded that most of the besieged areas are in densely populated cities unsuitable for airdropped deliveries.

Richard Gowan, a senior fellow at the European Council on Foreign Relations, said the United Nations’ response reflected the practical considerations its officials face in trying to do their job under extreme political pressure.

“If Russian aviation companies are making a quick buck out of this scenario, it is tantamount to war profiteering,” he said, “but I think that W.F.P. and other aid agencies turn to the Russian firms because there are few real operational alternatives.”

According to a database of Russian company information, Abakan’s parent company, Avializing Invest, is owned by the Ustimenkos. (Abakan Air referred questions about this article to the World Food Program.) In 2007, the Ustimenkos were found to have paid a United Nations official at least $186,000 in kickbacks. At the time, the Ustimenkos, through the company Avicos, sold aviation insurance to carriers contracted by the United Nations, and according to an internal investigation, they extracted valuable information about aviation contracts in exchange.

Details of the investigation, published by WikiLeaks, showed the payments had been made to a Russian diplomat who worked for the United Nations procurement division: Alexander Yakovlev.

“The payments were made through front companies associated with senior managers of Avicos in exchange for Mr. Yakovlev’s assistance with Avicos’ business projects in relation to the United Nations,” the inquiry concluded. It recommended that “this company, in any form and in any capacity, be banned from any United Nations business, either directly or indirectly, including as an affiliate of any other vendor.”

The Ustimenkos returned — this time with Abakan Air. By early 2016, its Ilyushin cargo plane was flying over Deir al-Zour. The Russian Foreign Ministry even posted pictures on Twitter:

Follow Somini Sengupta on Twitter @SominiSengupta.

Somini Sengupta reported from the United Nations, and Sophia Kishkovsky from Moscow. Doris Burke contributed research from New York.

A version of this article appears in print on  , Section A, Page 6 of the New York edition with the headline: Barred From U.N. Work in Graft Case, Russians Return to Airdrop Aid. Order Reprints | Today’s Paper | Subscribe

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