Sergey Nikiforov

Nikiforov was the head of the Ivanovskoye village in Selemdzhinsky District, Amur Oblast; he opposed gold mining companies attempting to occupy the ancestral reindeer pastures and commercial hunting grounds of Evenks, and prevented district and regional officials from closing the Evenki national kindergarten in the village; In October 2013, a criminal case was opened against Nikiforov and he was charged with abuse of power as head of a local government body and large-scale bribery; he was placed under house arrest; at the trial it turned out that at the time when, according to the case materials, Nikiforov received the bribe in Blagoveshchensk, he was actually in the administrative centre of his district, the village of Ekimchan, 655 kilometres from the regional capital; the only witness in the case, speaking in court, did not identify Nikiforov, saying that she had not met him; the bribe-giver was not prosecuted; on September 28 2015, Nikiforov was sentenced to five years in a strict regime colony; on December 9, the court of second instance reduced the sentence to four years. He was released by October 2017.