Kharkiv plant, famous for Gvozdika self-propelled guns, to consider relaunching production

Kharkiv Tractor Plant (KhTZ), which is part of Ukrainian businessman Oleskandr Yaroslavskyi’s DCH Group, will consider resuming production of military equipment at the company’s extraordinary meeting of shareholders scheduled for 14 November.

The shareholders are proposed to add new business activity codes, including ‘production of weapons and ammunition’ and ‘production of military vehicles’.

Interfax-Ukraine was the first to report this.

In 2016, immediately after the acquisition of the plant, Mr Yaroslavsky said that KhTZ could start manufacturing military equipment.

"In addition to agricultural products, KhTZ once produced military equipment, and I am ready to finance the production of military equipment, and we have all the engineering potential," he was quoted as saying at the time.

Kharkiv Tractor Plant once produced MT-LB combat vehicles, and then their demilitarised version, the KhTZ-3N tracked vehicles.

In 2017, KhTZ CEO Oleksandr Koval said that the company was working on a prototype of multi-purpose light armoured transporters (MT-LB) for the defence ministry without Russian equipment.

KzTZ  also mass-produced the 122-mm 2C1 Gvozdika self-propelled gun on the MT-LB chassis for more than 20 years.

Back then, diesel engines for self-propelled howitzers and armoured personnel carriers were manufactured at engine plants in Russia.

In July 2022, DCH Group reported that the war had completely destroyed one of its plants, a shopping mall and two of its infrastructure facilities in the Kharkiv region.