A purge of senior Russian military officials suspected of corruption began at the end of April. The clear-out was aimed at those who owed allegiance to the former Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu and was seen as a power play between him and the Federal Security Service (FSB). It has continued, however, under his replacement, Andrey Belousov.
On Thursday, August 1 the former head of the Military Construction Branch (VSK), Sergei Sukhov, was arrested on suspicion of fraud. He was responsible for the letting of contracts for construction of operational, technical and residential buildings anywhere and for any purpose needed by Russia’s Armed Forces.
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He is suspected of taking bribes from a number of companies who performed work for VSK under government contracts and is suspected to have pocketed around 200 million rubles ($2.3 million). The investigations are also likely to involve not only employees of the companies concerned but Sergei Gorsky, the former head head of the VSK project support department who later became the general director of SK Patriot LLC, one of the companies believed to be involved in the corruption.
On Monday, August 5, the deputy head of the Main Directorate for Innovative Development of the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation, Major General Vladimir Shesterov was arrested on suspicion of embezzling funds allocated for the operation of the “Patriot Park” and exhibition center.
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The park was built under the direction of Shoigu and his deputy Ivanov, who was arrested in April. The site covers an area of more than 3,500 hectares (8,650 acres) and contains military-patriotic museums, zones for military and historic displays and events, as well as Ministry of Defense’s main church which alone cost 2 billion rubles ($23.3 million).
One of the popular attractions at the park is a reenactment of the 1945 capture of Berlin’s Reichstag by the Red Army:
Along with Shesterov, the director of the park, Colonel Vyacheslav Akhmedov, and several other employees were detained for questioning.
Then today, August 6 the former head of the clothing department of the Russian Ministry of Defense reserve colonel Vladimir Demchik, was arrested suspected of accepting a bribe of 4 million rubles ($47,000), in 2017 from the head of a company that, over the following two years, was awarded 26 government contracts for the provision of various items of military equipment worth more than 574 million rubles ($6.7 million).
On retiring from the Ministry of Defense, Demchik was appointed deputy general director of Textile Trading Company LLC, part of the Tchaikovsky Textile group of companies.
Sources close to the Kremlin told the Moscow Times in May that “The FSB is purging Shoigu’s team. This is an expected process. The security forces received permission from the very top. There is still a long way to go before the cleanup is completed. New arrests await us.”
On of its sources said, “Hundreds of people will be arrested,” because President Vladimir Putin had ordered the FSB to purge the Ministry of Defense because “Someone must be to blame for the failure of the invasion [of Ukraine]. Which means that “… either the special services that were engaged in reconnaissance and analytical preparation for the war and promised Putin a triumphant operation and a quick victory... or the leader of the ‘second army of the world’ – Shoigu was responsible for the disaster,” the source said.
Thus far more than a dozen high ranking military officers and officials are facing charges with a process that began with the Deputy Defense Minister Timur Ivanov, with the likelihood that yet more will follow as Putin’s war continues to fail.
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