ROSTOV-ON-DON. Aug 23 (Interfax-AVN) - A police patrol found the body of an armed deserter in the Voroshilovsky district of Rostov-on-Don on Friday morning, a spokesman for the Rostov region police department told Interfax-Military News Agency.
"Experts have determined that the soldier committed suicide," the spokesman said.
It has also been established that the soldier had nothing to do with the robbery attempt committed in Rostov-on-Don earlier that night, he said.
Private Sergei Lushkin from the 11th Communications Brigade, based near Rostov-on-Don, deserted his post early on Thursday carrying an assault rifle and 30 cartridges. Lushkin was on duty guarding warehouses. At 3:00 a.m. Moscow time (2300 GMT), he was absent from his post.
Lushkin was born at the Novobataiskoe village in the Rostov region in 1983, and recruited on May 11, 2001. He spent nine years at school. The brigade he served in is subordinate to the Russian Armed Forces' chief of communications.