The Israeli Defense Ministry on Monday allowed an aircraft manufacturer suspected of testing one of its “suicide drones” against the Armenian military on behalf of Azerbaijan in 2017, in violation of Israeli law, to again sell the unmanned aerial vehicles to the Azeris, The Times of Israel reports.
At the same time, the export licenses of three senior officials from the defense contractor Aeronautics Ltd. — CEO Amos Matan, deputy CEO Meir Rizmovitch and a third, unnamed, employee — were to be suspended by the Defense Ministry beginning in April, the company said.
The announcement was made after the Defense Ministry said last week that it had decided to revoke the export licenses of the three senior officials.
Many details of the case were suppressed under a court-issued gag order, which remained in place as of Monday.
The Defense Ministry’s decision came three weeks after the Rafael defense contractor agreed to purchase Aeronautics for NIS 850 million ($231.7 million).
In August 2017, reports emerged that the company was suspected of using the Orbiter 1K kamikaze drone to attack Armenian forces in the disputed Nagorno-Karabakh region during a demonstration for Azeri officials. A copy of the complaint was first leaked to the Maariv newspaper.
A week and a half after the allegation came to light, the Defense Ministry announced it was suspending Aeronautics’ export license to Baku — identified by the company only as “central client ‘A,’” per the gag order.
In August 2018, the State Attorney’s Office also announced that it intended to indict Matan, Rizmovitch, and other senior officials in the company in connection with the alleged illegal live-fire test.
The Armenian National Committee of America has strongly condemned the decision.