Hanno Pevkur #
Introduction #
Hanno Pevkur is an Estonian Reform Party politician who served as the country’s minister of defence from July 2022 until his resignation in September 2026. He stepped down after it emerged that the Estonian Centre for Defence Investments (RKIK), the country’s military procurement agency, had committed roughly €70 million in European Union funds to buy artillery shells for Ukraine from companies that, as Euronews reported, “had never previously sold a single artillery shell”. Pevkur announced the decision on public broadcaster ETV, saying a leader must take political responsibility for his whole portfolio even where he bears no personal fault.
Background Information #
Pevkur, of the governing Reform Party, had led the defence ministry since July 2022. The deal at the centre of his downfall dated to 2024, when Estonian public broadcaster ERR reported that the government had agreed to acquire artillery shells for Ukraine, paying €70 million upfront from the EU’s European Peace Facility, an instrument increasingly used to finance military assistance for Kyiv. Per Brussels Signal, the RKIK in 2024 signed four deals with Datasel S.R.L., an Italian-registered company acquired that March by Neco Defence Munitions, an Indian-owned firm; neither company had a record of selling artillery shells. The first contract, signed in August 2024, carried €15 million upfront; advances across the four deals totalled about €70 million. The first batch was due in Ukraine by November 2024, but deliveries slipped while further contracts were still signed; the RKIK later terminated the deals and demanded the money back, with the main dispute due to go to arbitration in Strasbourg.
The Controversy or Incident That Led to Their Cancellation #
Allegations. What is documented is the resignation, the National Audit Office’s findings, the unfulfilled contracts and Pevkur’s own statements. No criminal charges have been announced against anyone; the prosecutor’s office has only opened an inquiry into circumstances covered by the audits. Characterizations of the supplier companies come from the cited reporting, and the allocation of blame among the ministry, the RKIK and the companies remains contested.
On August 28, 2026, the National Audit Office said it could not verify Defence Forces inventories worth about €1.2 billion and flagged weak controls on contracts and goods received. The audit also found the RKIK had taken on budget risks of about €70 million through contracts brokering equipment and stocks for other countries, while the ministry had told the Riigikogu, Estonia’s parliament, the opposite, and those contracts had been withheld from the auditors the previous year; auditor general Janar Holm said the ministry, the Defence Forces and the RKIK “have not made sufficient efforts in return to resolve the serious problems with the use of funds and the accounting of assets and inventories”. On September 1, the prosecutor’s office opened a criminal inquiry into circumstances covered by that year’s and the previous year’s audits, with no charges announced.
On September 2, Pevkur told ERR’s flagship bulletin Aktuaalne kaamera that the audit findings were serious enough for him to take political responsibility: “As defence minister, I of course have to recognise that I am responsible for the entire area under my ministry … a leader must have both the courage and the stature to take responsibility as a matter of political responsibility, even when there is no personal responsibility. I will take that responsibility and the prime minister will have to find a new defence minister.” Euronews quoted him saying that “the minister does not count socks and ammunition or conduct contract negotiations”, and that “the defence minister makes the fundamental decision to support Ukraine”; he stressed that he had not read the contracts, since ministers are not traditionally involved in individual procurement details. The contracts were first detailed by Eesti Ekspress, which reported that a shipment which did arrive in 2025 was faulty; Pevkur told ERR the rounds were not “useless” but of poor quality and incomplete, and that none were to reach Ukraine until Estonia had inspected them.
Public Reaction and Consequences #
Coalition and opposition figures had called on Pevkur to go, among them Eesti 200 group chairman Toomas Uibo and Social Democratic Party leader Lauri Läänemets. Opposition Isamaa MP Urmas Reinsalu, chairing the state budget control select committee, said the ministry had told parliament it had taken on no such Ukraine-procurement liabilities. Prime Minister Kristen Michal said he saw no personal fault but did not rule out political responsibility, and called a cabinet meeting for September 3 with the auditor general. In Brussels, European Commission spokesperson Christian Wigand said the commission was in contact with Estonian authorities to investigate whether Estonia must pay back the €70 million of European Peace Facility funds, adding, “There are, of course, safeguards and there are recovery processes in place to make sure that taxpayers’ money is well spent.”
The supplier side disputed the narrative: Datasel told Eesti Ekspress through its lawyer that it was “the party that has suffered losses in connection with these supply contracts”, that the RKIK’s reasons for the extraordinary termination were “contradictory and illogical”, and that it had supplied goods and submitted invoices totalling €58 million against advances it put at €59 million. Current RKIK director general Elmar Vaher, who did not sign the contracts, told Ekspress he would not have done so; former RKIK head Magnus-Valdemar Saar said no large decision went through without ministry approval, with papers going to Pevkur and then-permanent secretary Kusti Salm during the first contract talks. Euronews noted the resignation followed the high-profile departure of Latvia’s defence minister Andris Sprūds in May.
Current Status #
Pevkur was to remain in office until a successor was named, with parliament’s autumn sittings beginning on September 14. Estonia is disputing the contracts in a case before the European Court of Arbitration in Strasbourg, and the European Commission is examining whether the €70 million in EU funds must be repaid. The prosecutor’s criminal inquiry opened on September 1 remained pending, with no charges announced against any individual.
Impact on Their Career/Life #
The resignation ended Pevkur’s four-year run as defence minister, one of Estonia’s weightiest portfolios given a 2026 defence budget of 5.4 per cent of GDP, about €2.4 billion. His stated position — political but not personal responsibility, and that he never read the contracts — now stands against audit findings and officials’ accounts that ministry-level papers circulated during the original deal talks. Whatever the inquiry and arbitration conclude, the €70 million stranded-advance affair became the defining episode of his tenure, and he left office as the second Baltic defence minister in roughly four months to resign amid a defence-procurement row.