As it became known to Kommersant, this morning the FSB investigation group started searches in the offices of the employees of the Central Research Institute of Mechanical Engineering (TsNIIMash), as well as in the office of Director of the Research and Analysis Center of the United Missile and Space Corporation Dmitry Payson. According to Kommersant's information, operational activities are conducted within the framework of a criminal case initiated under Art. 275 of the Criminal Code (State Treason). Now the FSB is inspecting a dozen people from the industry for their cooperation with Western intelligence services: according to Kommersant's information, the KGB officers established that the latter became aware of the results of the Russian industry's developments in the field of hypersonic developments under the stamp "Top Secret."

The searches, which started simultaneously in TsNIIIMash (located in Korolev) and the ORKK building (located in Moscow), "Kommersant" sources told law enforcement. According to them, operational activities and seizure of documents in the criminal case under Art. 275 of the Criminal Code (State Treason) is being conducted by the FSB investigation team. In Korolev, as the interlocutors of Kommersant specified, searches are conducted in several offices of the Institute's staff, in ORKK - in the office of the director of the research and analysis center of the ORKK, Dmitry Payson. The head of the Roskosmos press service, Vladimir Ustimenko, did not go into details, this fact confirmed: "The general director of the state corporation, Dmitry Rogozin, instructed our security service to provide maximum support to the investigative bodies."

According to Kommersant's information, in the framework of the recently opened criminal case, operatives check information on the involvement of officials in the deliberate transfer of information classified as Top Secret about Russian hypersonic projects to foreign special services. "It is established that the leak occurred from the employees of TsNIIMash, with whom Dmitry Payson maintained close contact," says one of the interlocutors of Kommersant, who is familiar with the FSB materials. They refused to name the names of the defendants of the case and their procedural status, referring to the secret of the investigation.

The interlocutor of "Kommersant" noted that the forthcoming debriefing will be "unprecedented": "Many heads will fly, and some dismissals will not end exactly."

TsNIIMash is the head scientific organization of Roskosmos - despite the fact that the Corporation "Tactical Missile Arms" is engaged in hypersonic projects, which is not part of the perimeter of the state corporation, the level of cooperation between enterprises is very high. And TsNIIMash employees, who had the appropriate form of admission, had information about many subtleties and nuances of hypersonic developments of a defensive nature.

Mr. Payson, in turn, also worked in TsNIIMash, after which he transferred to the Skolkovo Foundation for the position of Director for Science of the Cluster of Space Technologies and Telecommunications. As noted on the Fund's website, he was engaged in program-targeted planning of space activities, development of recommendations on the development of its institutional framework, including the system of bringing the results of space activities to end users, public-private partnerships, international cooperation in space, technological platforms in the field of space activities and etc. Participated in the development and actualization of the Federal Space Program, the Strategy for the Development of the Rocket and Space Industry. Dmitry Payson was scientific supervisor of research and supervised interaction with the Institute of Applied Mathematics of Keldysh RAS, MIPT, a number of other enterprises and organizations in carrying out research on the study and modeling of the institutional environment of space activities.

Prior to joining Skolkovo, Mr. Payson worked at the leading research institute of the rocket and space industry, took part in the planning and implementation of start-up projects in the telecommunications field. He was engaged in program-targeted planning of space activities, development of recommendations on the development of its institutional framework, including the system of bringing the results of space activities to end users, public-private partnerships, international cooperation in space, technological platforms in the field of space activities. He participated in the development and updating of the Federal Space Program, the Strategy for the Development of the Rocket and Space Industry. With Roskosmos he began to closely cooperate in 2014, when the ORKK was headed by Igor Komarov: at the suggestion of the latter, he headed the analytical center under the corporation.

However, after the arrival of Dmitry Rogozin in Roskosmos, the situation changed.

According to Kommersant sources, a few days before the searches Mr. Payson was notified of his imminent dismissal: this was due to the fact that the new organizational structure of the state corporation formed by Mr. Rogozin does not provide a place for the research and analysis center of the ORKK.

After the searches, the process of his dismissal will sharply accelerate, says the source of Kommersant in the state corporation: "The documents will be signed in the very near future."