The military intelligence agency of the United Kingdom sees signs of purges ongoing in the Russian defense industry as some corrupt officials have been arrested.
As reported by the British Ministry of Defense on X.
According to Russian media, the head of the Russian Defense Ministry’s Military Construction Company, Andrei Belkov, has been arrested on charges of corruption related to procurement activity.
The Military Construction Company was set up in 2019 specifically to achieve efficiencies with the then Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu praising the ”special internal and external audit regime” that the company would bring to the defense sector.
In reality, British intelligence states, it is likely the company has been used to extract rents by corrupt officials.
Separately on 23 July 2024, the former director of the Zvezda-Strela tactical missile plant was sentenced to prison for embezzlement and price inflation by a court in Rostov-on-Don.
The UK military intelligence agency observes that corruption is ”endemic in the Russian defense industry.”
”In 2007, an audit commissioned by the then Defense Minister Sergei Ivanov revealed that 70% of Ministry of Defense budgetary resources were used for purposes other than those officially designated,” the report reads.
Some of this corruption is tolerated by the Kremlin, but as British intel notes, there have been increasing crackdowns on those not sufficiently politically protected since the start of the Russo-Ukrainian War.
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