A record number of senior officials were arrested. It's about embezzlement of defense funds

In 2025, 155 high-ranking officials were arrested in Russia, Novaya Gazeta Europa reports. This is the highest number of such cases in ten years. Most of the detainees are accused of embezzlement of defense funds.

Thursday's publication by the independent website Novaya Gazeta Europa shows that over the last two and a half months alone – from August to mid-October 2025 – over 50 high-ranking officials and parliamentarians were arrested on corruption charges. According to the calculations of the report's authors, the number of cases against high-ranking officials increased by 27 percent compared to last year. and almost three times compared to the pre-war year 2021. According to journalists from Nowa Gazeta Europa this is the highest value in ten years.

The recently detained include four deputy governors and eight ministers (both serving and retired). Among those arrested were: Oleg Chemezov and Aleksandr Vlasov, deputy governors of the Sverdlovsk region and Krasnodar Krai. The former Minister of Health of Dagestan, Tatyana Belyaeva, the mayor of Vladimir, Dmitry Naumov, the commander of the National Guard of North Ossetia, Valery Golota, and the former Minister of Health of Arkhangelsk, Alexander Gershtansky, were also detained.

Many of the cases are directly related to the hostilities in Ukraine. For example, the case against Vladimir Bazarov, acting deputy governor of the Kursk Oblast, who previously held a similar position in the Belgorod Oblast, is the latest in a series of investigations into embezzlement during the construction of fortifications on the border with Ukraine. According to law enforcement agencies, Bazarov is involved in the embezzlement of budget funds allocated for these projects. In turn, Andrei Tyurin from the Ministry of Defense is suspected of signing fictitious documents and obstructing the implementation of the defense contract, as a result of which the ministry suffered losses exceeding 40 million rubles.

Calculations carried out by journalists show that security service employees were most likely to be put behind bars (32%), employees of the construction, housing and municipal services sector (21%) and the transport industry (14%).

Tomasz Dawid Jędruchów (PAP)

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