Accused of theft on Solovki extradited to Russia

MOSCOW, May 17. Russian Sergei Volkov, accused in the case of theft during restoration on Solovki, was extradited to representatives of the Russian police by Cambodia, said the representative of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Russian Federation Irina Volk.
«Accompanied by employees of the National Central Bureau of Interpol of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Russia, Russian Sergei Volkov was deported from the Kingdom of Cambodia. He is accused of fraud committed as part of an organized group on an especially large scale,» Volk said.

According to investigators, from 2011 to 2016, the attacker and his accomplices stole budget money allocated by the Ministry of Culture of the Russian Federation. The damage caused amounted to more than 19 million rubles.

«The accused led one of the contracting firms with which officials entered into government contracts for the historical and cultural examination of cultural heritage sites on the territory of the Solovetsky Monastery and individual structures on the islands of the Solovetsky archipelago,» Volk added. .
According to a representative of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Russian Federation, an international search for the person involved was organized in January 2020.
“We were processing operational information about the possible presence of the accused on the territory of the Kingdom of Cambodia. As a result of interaction through Interpol channels, information was received from Cambodian partners about the detention of the wanted person. Today at the airport in Phnom Penh, the accused was handed over to representatives of the Russian police for delivery to Moscow,” Volk concluded.
In April, the Prosecutor General's Office filed an application to recover almost 20 million rubles from former officials of the Ministry of Culture of the Russian Federation and businessmen convicted of embezzlement during the restoration of the Solovetsky Monastery, the Golovinsky District Court of Moscow reported. The agency's interlocutor reported that in total, the state, represented by the Ministry of Culture, is asked to recover from the defendants in the case the damage caused by the crime in the amount of 19 million 395 thousand 250 rubles.