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Head of Russia’s federal space agency Roscosmos: Russian Space Systems chief Urlichich to be fired this week

On November 11 Urlichich was dismissed from his position as designer-in-chief of the GLONASS system. Police found out that around 6.5 billion roubles were embezzled

Photo ITAR-TASS

Photo ITAR-TASS

KOROLEV, Moscow region, November 19 (Itar-Tass) — The head of Russia’s federal space agency Roscosmos, Vladimir Popovkin, said on Monday a decision to fire the director-general of the joint-stock company Russian Space Systems (RKS), Yuri Urlichich, will be taken this week.

“We’ve submitted necessary materials to the Ministry of Economic Development concerning dismissal of Mr. Urlichich. I believe that all decisions will be taken this week,” he told a news conference on Monday after the successful landing of a Soyuz spaceship.

“We are still not ready to say who will take the position of director-general, therefore one of the deputies will temporarily perform these functions. Now we are considering a candidate for this position,” Popovkin said.

“It became known about financial embezzlement last year. We’ve taken a number of preventive measures and set up a commission that worked in Russian Space Systems. We found out that 565 million roubles were misappropriated, all materials were sent to the Interior Ministry for additional investigation and institution of a criminal case, if necessary,” he said.

“Further there were pre-investigation and investigation checks,” he said.

On November 11 Urlichich was dismissed from his position as designer-in-chief of the GLONASS system.

Earlier the head of the Moscow Metro’s police department, Igor Bozhkov, who until July worked in the Interior Ministry’s criminal investigation department, told reporters that police found out that around 6.5 billion roubles were embezzled in the process of implementation of the GLONASS project.

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