Defense Ministry official and businessman linked to Shoigu's former deputy die mysteriously in Russia

Russia has confirmed the deaths of businessman Igor Kotelnikov and Defense Ministry official Magomed Khandayev, both involved in a corruption case. They were also both linked to the former deputy of ex-Minister Sergei Shoigu, the arrested Timur Ivanov.

The former was an accused and was held in solitary confinement in a pre-trial detention center, and the latter was a witness. They died a day apart. This was reported by the Institute for the Study of War (ISW), citing data provided by the Russian media.

The propagandists reported that 52-year-old businessman Igor Kotelnikov, accused of bribing senior officials of the Russian Defense Ministry, died of heart failure in a pre-trial detention center in Moscow on July 8.

A Russian insider source claimed that officers of the Russian Federal Security Service "tried to force" him to testify against Ivanov and other unnamed defense officials. He was said to have fallen ill in solitary confinement.

At the same time, a blogger affiliated with the Wagner PMC said that Kotelnikov had agreed with the FSB military counterintelligence to testify against Ivanov, and now he had "suddenly" died.

According to the Kremlin media, the next day, July 9, 62-year-old Magomed Khandayev, head of the Defense Ministry's State Expertise Department, also died in Moscow of unspecified causes.

He was a former subordinate of Ivanov. The Russian authorities interrogated him as a witness in his case but did not bring any criminal charges or send him to prison.

ISW did not comment on the possible causes of the mysterious deaths of the Russian businessman and official. They only emphasized their connection with Ivanov, who, according to Russian investigators, conspired with third parties to receive bribes "in the form of providing property services during contracting and subcontracting for the needs of the Ministry of Defense."

"Ivanov was arrested on April 24, 2024, on charges of taking bribes, and his arrest was the first arrest in a long-running large-scale removal of Russian defense officials," the analysts reminded.

Earlier, Russian investigators began analyzing Ivanov's telephone conversations. Several new examinations were ordered in his case. Russian investigators began to study the documents and electronic media seized during the searches and were waiting for a response to the FSB's requests.

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