MOSCOW. June 20 (Interfax) - Timur Ivanov, who is under arrest in connection with a corruption case, has been dismissed as Russian deputy defense minister, his lawyer Murad Musayev said.
"You probably know that the Defense Ministry's personnel has changed a lot recently. Timur Ivanov is not an exception," Musayev told reporters on Thursday.
The lawyer said that, judging by the documents available to the defense, "Timur Ivanov's dismissal is in no way connected to the criminal case." "He has just been relieved of his post," Musayev said.
He did not say when his client was dismissed.
On Thursday, Moscow's Basmanny district court granted an investigator's request to extend Ivanov's arrest until September 23. His suspected accomplice, the Volzhsky Bereg company's director Sergei Borodin, had also his arrest extended. The hearing was held behind closed doors.
Both will remain in custody until September 23.
The lawyers had asked the court to release their clients and place them under house arrest or ban from certain activities.
Ivanov and Borodin were detained in April and charged with accepting a particularly large bribe. Alexander Fomin, the founder of the Olympcitystroy company, has also been arrested in the case and charged with giving a bribe.
According to the investigators, Ivanov conspired with Borodin, whom he maintained friendly relations with, as well as third parties "to commit a crime as an organized group and take a particularly large bribe in the form of property-related services provided under contracts and subcontracts for the Defense Ministry."
Musayev told Interfax earlier that, as the bill of indictment said, "Ivanov provided assistance to certain companies, contractors of the Defense Ministry, which in return gratuitously performed construction and repair work at facilities allegedly belonging to Ivanov."
Musayev said Ivanov was charged with accepting a bribe valued at about 1 billion rubles.
Ivanov and co-defendants have denied guilt.
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