Russian state prosecutors are aiming for a nearly 15-year prison term for former Deputy Defense Minister Timur Ivanov, who faces charges of bribery and embezzlement, according to a report by Vedomosti, a business newspaper.
Ivanov, 49, who oversaw military construction initiatives, was taken into custody in April 2024 as part of a broader Kremlin campaign against corruption within the Defense Ministry.
Dubbed the “glamorous general” by Russian media, Ivanov is the highest-ranking military official to be arrested following the onset of the Ukraine invasion in 2022. He held the position of deputy minister since 2016 and was regarded as a close associate of former Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu, who was dismissed in May and given the role of secretary of Russia’s Security Council.
Initially, Ivanov and his colleague, businessman Sergei Borodin, were charged with receiving kickbacks amounting to 1.19 billion rubles (approximately $15.1 million) related to Defense Ministry contracts.
In October, prosecutors added further accusations, claiming that Ivanov and his alleged co-conspirators embezzled 4.1 billion rubles (around $52.4 million) through foreign bank transactions, in addition to 216 million rubles involved in the purchase of two ferries for the Kerch Strait route linking southern Russia with occupied Crimea.
He is also alleged to have accepted over 152 million rubles in bribes from Alexander Fomin, a co-founder of the construction company Olimpsitistroy. Ivanov has denied all allegations against him.
Additionally, prosecutors are pursuing a 14-year sentence for Anton Filatov, a former director of the Defense Ministry’s subsidiary, Oboronlogistika, who is also implicated.
The case, which has remained confidential since March, is anticipated to reach a verdict by early July, as reported by Vedomosti.
In 2022, Ivanov was the focus of a prominent investigation conducted by the Anti-Corruption Foundation, established by the late opposition leader Alexei Navalny, which claimed that he had personally benefited from reconstruction efforts in the besieged Ukrainian city of Mariupol.
