The founder of the Z-edition Readovka, Alexey Kostylev, was arrested

He is suspected of stealing a billion rubles from the Russian Ministry of Defense

The creator of the Readovka publication, Alexei Kostylev, was detained in a case of major fraud . He is suspected of stealing a billion rubles from the Ministry of Defense during the execution of a government contract for the supply of UAVs, RBC reports from the Tverskoy Court of Moscow, where Kostylev is to be given a preventive measure. How it is connected with the supply of drones to the Russian army is still unclear.

Updated . The Tverskoy Court of Moscow sent Alexey Kostylev into custody until April 25.

The founder of Readovka has health problems after an ATV accident in the village of Ruhan in 2024. After Kostylev’s arrest, the “Russian Life” project, which he now heads, stated that he “survived craniotomy, two severe operations, cannot change clothes on his own, perform basic hygiene procedures, and experiences difficulties and restrictions in movement.” Kostylev needs medical care, the project added, calling not to take him into custody.

Readovka stated that the claims against Kostylev have nothing to do with the publication. “The management of the Ridovka holding provides maximum assistance to the investigative authorities. <...> The criminal case is not related to the publishing business and the activities of our information resources,” the publication reported , thanking Kostylev for “many years of joint work” and “contribution to the formation of the patriotic agenda in the Russian media environment.

Readovka is a publication that supported the war. Kostylev launched it in 2011 as a public blog about news from his native Smolensk region. Later he moved to Moscow and opened the Moscow edition of Readovka there. Before the start of the big war between Russia and Ukraine, the project was not considered pro-government, but then it became one of the popular mouthpieces for the invasion. After February 22, 2022, Readovka crossed the threshold of one million subscribers on Telegram (now it already has two million) and opened a number of side projects.

Kostylev tried to supply down jackets for the military

In their joint investigation, Meduza and The Bell reported that in the spring of 2022, Kostylev attended a meeting at the Russian Ministry of Defense, where they discussed the shortage of winter uniforms for the military. Kostylev volunteered to take on part of the supply of warm clothing. To begin with, he was instructed to send a thousand winter down jackets to the self-proclaimed LPR and DPR.

Kostylev planned to buy down jackets in China and sew military insignia on them. But by the time his team completed negotiations with the Chinese supplier and was ready to pay, Beijing began to block the export of khaki jackets to Russia so as not to violate Western sanctions. The project failed, and Kostylev “walked around with a white face” for some time, said two former employees of his publication.

Readovka worked on the “temnik” of the Kremlin ANO Dialogue, Meduza and The Bell found out . In a joint investigation in 2023, we said that shortly before the start of the war, Kostylev met Vladimir Tabak, the head of the Dialog ANO, which engages in online propaganda commissioned by the Kremlin, and instructed the Readovka editorial team to cover high-profile socio-political events according to instructions from Dialogue.

In 2025, Readovka came under the control of ANO Dialog. Andrey Tkachenko became its new director and owner. He worked at the ANO Dialog Regions, a subsidiary of the ANO Dialog, at least until 2024, the Agency wrote . Tkachenko called the deal with Kostylev commercial, but refused to name its amount. The anonymous telegram channel “EZH Lab” claimed that Kostylev transferred assets to Tkachenko due to an audit of law enforcement agencies “for misuse of budget funds.”

Readovka later gained control of the Ural propaganda publication Ura.ru. This happened against the background of the seizure of assets from the former beneficiaries of Ura.ru, entrepreneurs Artem Bikov and Alexei Bobrov, as well as against the background of the arrest of the head of the Sverdlovsk edition of the publication Denis Allayarov, who was accused of giving bribes to his uncle, a policeman, for access to operational reports of the Ministry of Internal Affairs. Having become the head of Ura.ru, Tkachenko announced the “disappointing” state of affairs in the publication’s finances, closed its regional editorial offices and refused to pay Allayarov’s lawyers.