Russian Prosecutor General’s Office demands former Moscow culture minister be stripped of assets

The Russian Prosecutor General’s Office has demanded the state recover over 1 billion rubles (€10.6 million) of assets from Moscow’s former culture minister and his associates, state-owned news agency TASS reported on Monday.

According to the lawsuit, Alexander Kibovsky and his wife officially earned a total of 211 million rubles (€2.2 million) between 2010 and 2024. However, the Prosecutor General’s Office alleged that Kibovsky had registered expensive real estate and vehicles they obtained as belonging to friends and relatives in order to hide his true wealth, TASS continued.

An audit revealed that Kibovsky had bought real estate and two cars for a total of 226.7 million rubles (€2.4 million), including seven apartments in Moscow and the Moscow region, since 2014, all of which were registered as belonging to his wife, her father, and a friend.

The Prosecutor General’s Office has also requested the seizure of assets from an associate of Kibovsky’s, Andrey Nerodenkov, who is currently being held in pretrial detention, whom it accused of receiving bribes worth 100 million rubles (€1.1 million). The Prosecutor General’s Office added that Nerodenkov and his family members own property worth over 1 billion rubles (€10.6 million), despite not having the “required legal income” to afford it, according to TASS.

Kibovsky was initially arrested in July 2024 and charged with eight counts of receiving bribes on an especially large scale and one count of attempted fraud on an especially large scale. Investigators believe he helped private companies win state contracts, for which he received bribes of over 100 million rubles (€1.1 million). Shortly after his arrest, Kibovsky made several unsuccessful attempts to get the charges against him dropped in exchange for enlisting to fight in Ukraine.