'Shoigu Provided Guards From SOF Fighters, We Had To Round Him Up Through Back Door'

Details of Timur Ivanov's arrest in the Russian Federation have become known.

Former Deputy Defence Minister Timur Ivanov knew in advance about the impending arrest and was preparing to resist, a source in the FSB familiar with the situation told The Insider.

According to the source, Shoigu had his deputy guarded by armed members of the Special Operations Forces to prevent the FSB from carrying out a surprise arrest.

For several months, the FSB's Military Counterintelligence Department had not been able to get close to Ivanov, and the special service had to resort to a trick.

On April 23, Ivanov came for a routine check-up at the 3rd Vishnevsky Central Clinical Hospital, and his guards, as usual, remained waiting for the deputy minister on the ground floor.

When Ivanov went up to the doctor's office alone, FSB officers were already waiting for him there. Having arrested the deputy minister, they took him out through the back door so that his guards would not know about it. A second source close to the investigation confirmed to The Insider that the detention took place in this way.

We remind you that on April 24, the Basmanny court of Moscow issued a sanction to arrest Ivanov for two months. According to the case materials, Ivanov is accused of taking bribes in the amount of more than 1.185 billion rubles. According to the investigation, from 2018 to 2023, co-owner of the Olimpstroi company Alexander Fomin and other unidentified persons built and restored an estate in Tver region on the banks of the Volga River and an estate in Chisty Pereulok in Moscow for the former deputy minister. In exchange, Ivanov presented Fomin's company with lucrative government contracts.

After Ivanov's arrest, Shoigu himself did not remain in his position for long. As defence minister, he took part in the May 9 military parade on Red Square, but in the evening of May 12, Putin removed him from his post and appointed former First Deputy Prime Minister Andrei Belousov as defence minister. Shoigu himself was appointed secretary of the Security Council, replacing Nikolai Patrushev (who in turn became Putin's shipbuilding adviser).