MOSCOW (AP) — A deputy head of Russia’s military general staff has been arrested on charges of large-scale bribery, Russian news reports said Thursday, the latest in a series of arrests for bribery of senior military officials.
The arrest of Lieutenant General Vadim Shamarin followed the arrest this week of Major General Ivan Popov, a former top commander in Russia’s offensive in Ukraine, also on bribery charges.
In April, Deputy Defense Minister Timur Ivanov was arrested for bribery. Ivanov was a close associate of Sergei Shoiguwho chairman Vladimir Putin dismissed as defense minister shortly after Putin’s inauguration for a new term in May.
Lieutenant General Yury Kuznetsov, head of the Defense Ministry’s Personnel Directorate, was arrested on bribery charges two days after Shoigu was replaced.
Shamarin is also head of the Defense Ministry’s main communications directorate. He will be held for two months, Russian news agencies quoted a military garrison court as saying, but other details of the case were not reported.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said the wave of arrests of defense officials did not indicate a campaign against the military.
“The fight against corruption is consistent work. This is not a campaign, it is ongoing work. This is an integral part of the activities of our law enforcement agencies,” he said in a conference call with journalists on Thursday.
Shoigu was widely blamed for Russia’s failure to capture Kiev early in the fighting in Ukraine and was accused of incompetence and corruption by mercenary leader Yevgeny Prigozhin, who launched a mutiny in June 2023 to demand his resignation of Shoigu and military chief of staff General Valery Gerasimov.
Less than a month after Prigozhin’s failed uprising, Popov was dismissed as commander of the 58th Army. He said he had spoken to Shoigu about inadequate equipment leading to disproportionate Russian deaths, and that his dismissal was a “treacherous” stab in the back to Russian forces in Ukraine.
Popov’s forces fought in the Zaporizhia region, one of the most contested areas in Ukraine’s conflict. His resignation came a day after the 58th Army command post in the city of Berdyansk was hit by a Ukrainian attack, killing a senior general.
