RAMT director Sofya Apfelbaum was interrogated by the Investigative Committee

Director of the Russian Academic Youth Theater Sofya Apfelbaum was interrogated by the Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation in the case of embezzlement of budget funds, Interfax reports citing its correspondent.

Apfelbaum left the department building in Moscow, refusing to comment.

Kirill Serebrennikov, the artistic director of the Gogol Center, is under interrogation in the Investigative Committee, who, like Apfelbaum, was searched as part of the case on May 23.

According to Interfax, investigators are interrogating two more defendants in the case, their names are not disclosed.

• Sofia Apfelbaum previously headed the Department of State Support for Culture of the Ministry of Culture of the Russian Federation. The criminal case, in which on May 23 searches were carried out at her, Kirill Serebrennikov’s and at the Gogol Center Theater, is connected, according to the Investigative Committee, with the embezzlement of budget funds allocated in 2011-2014 to Serebrennikov’s organization Seventh Studio “for the development and popularization of art" in the Russian Federation.
• During this period, the Ministry of Culture, according to its press service, allocated 216.6 million rubles to Seventh Studio. The UK stated that the case was connected with the theft of 200 million; the search warrant, which reviewed , refers to 66.5 million rubles. Meduza
• The status of Serebrennikov and Apfelbaum in the case is unknown.