A military court in Moscow has sent to pretrial detention Lieutenant General Vadim Shamarin, who is the latest top military official arrested in what the Kremlin has called its ongoing fight against corruption.
Representatives of the 235th Garrison Military Court told RBK news agency on May 23 that Shamarin, who also leads the armed forces' main directorate for communications, is suspected of accepting a bribe of an "especially large amount."
Also on May 23, several media outlets and news agencies in Russia quoted sources as saying that investigators detained Vladimir Verteletsky, a top official of the Defense Ministry's Department for Handling Armament Orders, on corruption charges. Those reports have yet to be officially confirmed.
SEE ALSO: Ukraine Live Briefing: Russian Kills POWs, Says Kyiv"The fight against corruption is a consistent work. It is not a campaign; it is a constant ongoing work," Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on May 23 after news spread of Shamarin's detention.
President Vladimir Putin recently relieved his close ally, Sergei Shoigu, of his duties as defense minister.
Shoigu had been accused of incompetence and corruption by mercenary leader Yevgeny Prigozhin, who in June last year attempted a mutiny while demanding the dismissal of Shoigu and the military chief of staff, General Valery Gerasimov. Prigozhin was later killed in a plane crash that many believe was retaliation by the Kremlin for the mutiny.
The move to detain Shamarin comes days after the former commander of Russia’s 58th Army, Major General Ivan Popov, was arrested on fraud charges reportedly linked to the alleged embezzlement of 100 million rubles ($1.1 million) allocated for military needs in Ukraine's Russian-occupied Zaporizhzhya region.
It also followed the arrest last week of Lieutenant General Yury Kuznetsov, who headed the personnel directorate of Russia's Defense Ministry, in an alleged corruption case.
SEE ALSO: The Week In Russia: The War Is His EverythingIn late April, police detained Deputy Defense Minister Timur Ivanov on bribe-taking charges and a court later sent him to pretrial detention for at least two months.
Putin replaced Shoigu with former First Deputy Prime Minister Andrei Belousov, 65, a politician who specializes in economic matters. The move is seen as part of a strategy to make the armed forces more streamlined with Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine now in its third year.
On May 20, Putin appointed Oleg Savelyev, the former minister on Crimean affairs, to the post of deputy defense minister.
The 58-year-old Savelyev also served as deputy minister for economic development and as the auditor at the Audit Chamber, a parliamentary group that serves as a financial watchdog.