Russian policemen receiving apartments as 'gifts'

The Russian Ministry of internal affairs replied to an investigation, conducted by the Novaya Gazeta, into ties between the police and a developer in Stavropol. The reply was that the ties are legal.

Recently, the Novaya Gazeta revealed that, according to the developer`s official site, policemen in Stavropol receive apartments as gifts from a local developer.

Russian policemen cannot legally accept gifts worth more than USD 50.

The prices for apartments from YugStroiInvest, the developer, start from USD 16 000.

Apart from this, YugStroiInvest employees attacked Ilya Varlamov, a blogger from Moscow, who came to Stavropol to write about local problems. Varlamov was beaten and sprayed with ‘brilliant green’. The attackers spent two days in custody and were fined USD 8.

Other civil activists, investigating YugStroiInvest’s illegal development in a national park, have been attacked in Stavropol. One was beaten unconscious, and another shot with a gun. The attackers were never found.