Canadian Weapons in Russian Hands: How Cadex Rifles Get to Russia

Snipers in at least three units of the Russian army use Canadian Cadex sniper rifles.

This is stated in the GlobalNews investigation conducted with the participation of The Insider.

Despite the sanctions, the Russian importer continued to receive new batches of weapons, and circumstantial evidence points to possible logistics through the United States and Kazakhstan.

In February 2024, the Russian Combat Sniping Federation published a video of the acceptance of new rifles. In the footage, FBS President Yaroslav Yakubov is seen firing the Cadex Tremor 416 Barrett rifle developed at the request of the US Navy. Its muzzle energy is 3.3 times higher than that of an SVD, and the bullet maintains supersonic speed at a distance of up to 1700 meters.

Yakubov is an officer of the 155th Marine Brigade of the Russian Pacific Fleet, which is participating in the war against Ukraine. In 2022-2023, he commanded a group of snipers, and since August 2023, he has been the head of the Combat Sniping Federation and responsible for the brigade’s combat training.

Canadian rifles are not the only ones featured in the video with Yakubov. Another photo shows two instructors at a training range: one with a Barrett M107 rifle and the other with a Cadex sniper rifle. Another video thanking Montreal for the rifles was posted by a sniper from the Pavel Sudoplatov Battalion, part of the 58th Army of the Russian Federation.

Cadex CDX-33 Patriot Lite rifles chambered in .338 Lapua Magnum are also used by snipers from an unnamed airborne troop and special forces unit of the Russian National Guard. All these cases demonstrate the systematic use of Canadian products by the Russian military.

The Canadian Ministry of Foreign Affairs suggested that the weapons could have been captured on the battlefield, but this version does not explain the presence of branded cases with intact markings. Moreover, the Russian importer exhibited Cadex rifles at the OrelExpo-2025 exhibition in Moscow.

The only official importer of Cadex in Russia is Varyag. According to RosAccreditation, it imported 82 Cadex Defense rifles between February 2022 and February 2024. After the war started, its revenue increased from $742.8 thousand in 2021 to $2.1 million in 2023.

In addition to Cadex, Varyag imported weapons from the United States, Austria, the Czech Republic, Germany, and the United Kingdom, including Glock, Barrett, FN Herstal, Christensen Arms, and more than 140,000 rounds of ammunition. During the two years of the war, the company imported 501 firearms.

The investigation points to possible logistics through the United States and Kazakhstan. Before the war, Varyag cooperated with the American company ABF from Colorado. In 2022-2023, ABF supplied 53 rifles to Kazakhstan, which later appeared in Varyag.

The Kazakh recipient was the Kazohotrybolovsoyuz company, whose financial turnover increased with the outbreak of war. At the same time, its online store does not offer Cadex and other brands, which raises suspicions about the real purpose of the deliveries.