According to Russian news media, a military court found a former Russian commander who had criticized Moscow’s military leadership in Ukraine guilty of widespread fraud and sentenced him to five years in jail on Thursday.
Ivan Popov was convicted of stealing over 130 million roubles ($1.56 million) worth of metal products meant for the construction of fortifications along the Ukrainian frontline.
Popov was a former major general who commanded Russia’s 58th army, fought in Chechnya, and later led Russian units in southern Ukraine.
Popov’s lawyer told journalists he would appeal the verdict.
The former military man was tried alongside a businessman, Sergei Moiseyev. Another suspected accomplice, Lieutenant General Oleg Tsokov, was killed in Ukraine in 2023.
Several top defence ministry officials have faced criminal charges as part of a broad anti-corruption investigation that has shook the Russian military establishment over the last year, but Popov and his supporters claim his situation is unique and that he is being punished for speaking out.
Following a failed mutiny by Wagner mercenaries against Russia’s defence establishment in June 2023, Popov expressed his worries about how Moscow was conducting its war in Ukraine in a voice mail leaked by a Russian politician in July.
In it, he was heard complaining about the deaths of Russian soldiers from Ukrainian artillery, alleging that the Russian army lacked proper weapons and reconnaissance capabilities to spot enemy artillery.
Popov said he was dismissed shortly afterwards.
Upon his arrest in May 2024, popular Russian military bloggers spoke out in his defence, casting him as a talented general who had been punished for speaking truth to power.
As his trial neared its end last month, Popov penned an open letter to President Vladimir Putin asking to be sent to the front in exchange for the Kremlin leader quashing his criminal case.
