In Novosibirsk, hypersonic researchers Valery Zvegintsev and Vladislav Galkin were sentenced in a criminal case involving treason.
A correspondent for the Russian publication agency Kommersant-Siberia reported on the court’s decision directly from the courtroom, according to Kommersant and The Moscow Times.
Both experts were sentenced to 12.5 years in a maximum-security prison.
The physicists were prosecuted for publishing an article on gas dynamics in a foreign journal.
Valery Zvegintsev worked as a research fellow at the Khristianovich Institute of Theoretical and Applied Mechanics (ITAM) and founded the High-Speed Aerogasdynamics laboratory.
Security forces detained him in April 2023.
Vladislav Galkin is Zvegintsev’s colleague and co-author from Tomsk. Information about his detention emerged shortly after the arrest of the laboratory’s founder, after which both were charged under Article 275 of the Russian Criminal Code. The criminal proceedings concern the researchers’ joint scientific work published in an Iranian journal. The article covered the technical aspects of air intakes for supersonic aircraft.
Prior to publication, the article underwent two independent expert reviews, which found no information in the text constituting a state secret. Despite this, the investigation deemed the publication of the data to be a transfer of classified information.
The technologies described in the work are related to the development of the Russian missiles Kinzhal, Zircon, Avangard, and Sarmat.
Earlier, in September 2024, the Moscow City Court sentenced former Khristianovich Institute of Theoretical and Applied Mechanics (ITAM) director Alexander Shiplyuk to 15 years in a strict-regime penal colony. He was found guilty of treason for transmitting data to representatives of foreign countries.
Also, in May 2024, a verdict was handed down in St. Petersburg against Anatoly Maslov, a former senior research fellow at the same institute. He was sentenced to 14 years in prison on similar charges.
