MOSCOW: A Russian tycoon accused of embezzling tens of millions of dollars in a real estate scam was taken into custody in Moscow on Sunday after being deported from Cambodia, officials said.

Sergei Polonsky, who is in his 40s, was detained on an island off the southwestern town of Sihanoukville in Cambodia on Friday for overstaying his visa.

Upon his arrival at Domodedovo airport in Moscow, Polonsky was immediately taken into custody.

“Mr Polonski was extradited to Russia where he will be prosecuted according to the law,” Elena Alexeyeva of the Russian Interior Ministry said in a press release.

“He is a naughty man,” Uk Heisela, chief of the investigations unit at the Cambodian interior ministry’s immigration department, said.

Polonsky had lived illegally in Cambodia by over-staying his visa for more than two years and his activities “affect Cambodian national security”, Heisela said.

Eight other Russians have been arrested and also face deportation, he added.

Polonsky’s wife, Olga Deripaska, denied that he was living illegaly in Cambodia for the past two years.

“We received a new visa for a year in November,” she said.

Published in Dawn, May 18th, 2015

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