Russia's deputy defense minister, exposed in an investigation led by the team of late opposition leader Alexei Navalny, was taken into custody on Wednesday on suspicion of accepting large bribes.
The arrest of Timur Ivanov, a longtime ally of Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu, is the most dramatic corruption case in Russia in recent years. It comes amid a sharp increase in military spending amid the offensive in Ukraine.
Ivanov, 48, oversaw the construction and supply of the Armed Forces and was involved in Russia's high-profile restoration of the Ukrainian city of Mariupol, occupied by Moscow's troops.
“The Deputy Minister of Defense of the Russian Federation has been sent to a pre-trial detention center,” the press service of the Moscow courts said in a statement on social networks.
He faces up to 15 years in prison for receiving a bribe “on an especially large scale,” the department added.
Several independent Russian media outlets have stated that Ivanov and his family acquired enormous wealth through kickbacks on contracts he entered into at the ministry.
In December 2022, Navalny's team said it had received thousands of leaked emails from Ivanov's wife Svetlana Maniovich, showing a lavish lifestyle that went well beyond his official salary.
They said she spent hundreds of thousands of euros on luxury cars, jewellery, clothes, parties and luxury property and yacht rentals in the south of France.
Some transactions were conducted through third parties, including Defense Department contractors, he said.