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Roscosmos chief advisor Safronov rejects plea deal in high treason case

According to the lawyer, under the deal the former advisor to the space corporation CEO would get no more than two-thirds of the maximum sentence or 10 years

Ivan Safronov Valery Sharifulin/TASS

Ivan Safronov

© Valery Sharifulin/TASS

MOSCOW, July 28. /TASS/. An investigator offered former advisor to Roscosmos CEO and journalist Ivan Safronov, who is charged with high treason, to sign a plea bargain, but the defendant rejected the proposal, his lawyer Ivan Pavlov told TASS on Tuesday.

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"The investigator offered him a deal under which he would plead guilty and get no more than two-thirds of the maximum sentence or 10 years. This was said back on July 13. Safronov rejected this offer," Pavlov said.

According to the lawyer, under the plea deal Safronov had to disclose his sources. "This is what interests the investigator. Meanwhile, the investigators strongly deny any links between the charges and Ivan’s journalistic activity and here it turns out that they are interested in his information sources. Here the investigators contradict themselves," Pavlov noted.

Safronov earlier worked for Kommersant and Vedomosti newspapers and was appointed advisor to the Roscosmos chief in May 2020. On July 7, he was detained by the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) on suspicion of high treason. Safronov pleaded not guilty. Moscow’s Lefortovo Court placed him in custody until September 6.

The Federal Security Service says that Safronov was recruited in 2012 and in 2017 he provided the Czech intelligence agencies with information about Russian military and technical cooperation with African countries and Russian military activity in the Middle East. The information was later passed on to the US, according to the case materials.

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