2 more Russian Defense Ministry officials accused of corruption

By Elena Teslova

MOSCOW (AA) - The Russian Investigative Committee announced on Monday that two more Defense Ministry officials were charged with corruption.

The committee said in a statement that head of a military mission, Ivan Populovsky, and his colleague Grigory Zorin pleaded guilty during the investigation.

According to the committee, Populovsky and Zorin were bribed by several enterprises engaged in the implementation of a 1.2 billion rubles worth defense state order (some $13.2 million) to weaken control over the acceptance of produced items, as well as to obtain other privileges and preferences.

“Their involvement in other similar crimes, including those related to the theft of funds allocated for the needs of the state defense order, is being checked,” the committee said.

This year over a dozen Defense Ministry officials, including former first deputy defense minister, Timur Ivanov, have been held on corruption charges. Sergey Shoygu, who served as the defense minister for almost 12 years, was removed in May. He now heads the Security Council.