The Kremlin announced on Friday that Russian soldiers and civil servants deployed to Ukraine will not be required to declare their income, an exemption from anti-corruption laws at a time when Moscow is increasing incentives to leave to fight.
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“It’s about who operates in (four) regions,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told the press, referring to the four Ukrainian regions (those in Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson and Zaporizhia) that Moscow claims responsibility for. Annexation – without full control over them – and in the place where the fighting is currently taking place.
On Thursday evening, the Russian government issued a decree from President Vladimir Putin regarding “details” of anti-corruption rules “for some citizens during the special military operation” in Ukraine.
According to this provision, the military, police and security services personnel operating in Ukraine, as well as other civil servants who were sent there, “are no longer required to provide information on their income, expenses and property.”
This measure also applies to the “spouses and minor children” of the persons concerned and is retroactive to February 24, 2022, the date the offensive began in Ukraine.
In addition, the persons concerned are now entitled to receive “bonuses and donations” if they are “of a humanitarian nature” and “received in connection with participation in the military operation” in Ukraine.
This new provision is part of the Kremlin’s incentive measures to push Russians to leave to fight in Ukraine: promising big rewards, banking and real estate facilities, financial aid to families in case of death or injury, and so on.
In Russia, military personnel and officials close to the military-industrial complex are regularly convicted in high-profile corruption and embezzlement cases.
