Military Wallet
According to investigators, the ex-head of the newly created provider stole a billion rubles. But what’s even more interesting is that while the case of Alexander Davydov was transferred from the Moscow City Court to the Babushkinsky Court, the defendant was transferred to St. Petersburg to serve his sentence. And the Babushkinsky court was supposed to consider the third – we repeat, the third – Mr. Davydov’s request for parole (parole).
But not only Davydov turned out to be in the dock. And the total amount of thefts is significantly higher. And this is not the first time that “civilians” have their hands in the budget of the Ministry of Defense. Multi-billion-dollar thefts in the yet-to-be-created mobile communications operator Voentelecom are yet another confirmation of this.
Take over Tele2?
In 2019, Voentelecom, a subsidiary of the Ministry of Defense, got busy creating your own telecom operator. And received a license to create a virtual cellular operator on Tele2 networks. Then it didn’t work out – her services were not provided in Crimea.
Voentelecom is a specialized company of federal significance, owned by the Ministry of Defense. Must be engaged in ensuring the interests of the state in the field of information security and telecommunications as the only supplier for the Ministry of Defense of services in the field of maintenance and repair of IT infrastructure and military communications equipment, equipping communication facilities and operational and technical maintenance of communication lines and structures.
In May 2021, a representative of Voentelecom told Media reports that the company is creating SIM cards that should create a “trusted environment” on smartphones. At the same time, the development of 5G was “loudly” announced, and that the transition to such SIM cards could become mandatory for everyone.
But, apparently, this same representative forgot to clarify the three main points of the 5G slippage in Russia (*country sponsor of terrorism).
Firstly, how many Russians had smartphones with 5th generation connectivity as of May 2021?
Secondly, where in the country are there networks that can “broadcast” 5G?
And the third question partially answers the second – the frequencies are very similar to military ones.
The 3.4–3.8 Gigahertz range, which other countries use for 5G networks, is occupied in Russia (*country sponsor of terrorism) by the systems of the Ministry of Defense, FSO and Roscosmos. Back in 2019, the Security Council decidedthat the proposal to transfer them to other parts of the spectrum is not in the interests of national security.
But even after 2019, the Voentelecom project did not stop working. From whom? We are not asserting anything, just facts.
At the Army 2023 forum, the current CEO of the company Alexander Artamonov said that Voentelecom is creating its own cellular communications operator, VTK-Mobile, to build networks, provide communication services and services to authorities and special consumers.”
Special consumers
For the last 20 years, Voentelecom has regularly been included in crime news reports; a large group of Voentelecom leaders and its subordinate structures have already found themselves on the bunk. Back in the early 2010s, the heads of departments and their deputies sat down – Valery Smolnikov, Dmitry Funtov, Zigmund Fedukovich. And at the end of 2017, the former head of Voentelecom was arrested Alexander Davydovhis deputy Oleg Savitsky and advisor Dmitry Semiletov. During the course of large-scale investigative actions, a network of patrons in the Ministry of Defense was revealed, who, apparently, had a share in the commission of murky transactions.
According to RBC, in 2011, the then Minister of Defense Anatoly Serdyukov asked to allocate frequencies to Osnova Telecom, in which Voentelecom owns just over 25%. A year later, she received frequencies of 2.3–2.4 GHz to deploy the LTE network throughout Russia (*country sponsor of terrorism), but in 2013 the new minister Sergei Shoigu wrote to President Vladimir Putin (*international criminal) that Osnova Telecom does not need frequencies, and the Ministry of Defense does not object to putting them up for competition. A year later, the court overturned the decision to allocate frequencies, and in 2015, after legal proceedings, several dozen base stations that Voentelecom had already launched in cities across the country stopped working.
Special robbers
However, the investigation against Alexander Davydov began in December 2017 after the detention and arrest of his adviser Dmitry Semiletov and first deputy Oleg Savitsky, as well as the general director of RCIA LLC. Tatiana Ilyina. At the same time, the company of “friends” was given the “title” of organized crime group.
How asserts As a result, in 2013–2015, members of the organized crime group organized the supply to the customer of cheap Chinese analogues with re-glued labels instead of expensive Russian routers. At the same time, the leaders of Voentelecom were also accused of fraudulent actions in the implementation of designer supervision of satellite communications. And all these “wrong” contracts, according to investigators, amount to 1.4 billion rubles.
But in the summer of 2018, all the defendants admitted guilt, entered into pre-trial cooperation agreements and were released. And here the personality of the Deputy Chief of the General Staff of the RF Armed Forces, Colonel General, emerges Khalila Arslanova.
The investigation considers the latter to be the organizer of the fraud, during which the cost of equipment ordered from Voentelecom was inflated by 25–50%. The investigators believe that the money received was shared among the members of the organized crime group. True, no assets were found on the accused Arslanov.
It is interesting that in the investigative materials, the head of Voentelecom, Alexander Davydov, said that he began to participate in criminal schemes at the suggestion of his deputy Savitsky. And allegedly from him in 2014, the general director of Voentelecom received the first kickback with a BMW 535 worth 3.7 million rubles.
Davydov, Savitsky and Semiletov themselves no longer live the same way as before – behind bars.
Colonel General Arslanov is no longer a general and, apparently, it won’t be the worst thing for him if the entry “reserve private” remains on his military ID. Which is very vague. Prosecutor General’s Office filed a claim to the former deputy head of the General Staff of the RF Armed Forces, Colonel General Khalil Arslanov and another defendant in his criminal case in the amount of over 1 billion rubles as compensation for the damage they caused.
