A former Azeri defense ministry official who is on an Interpol wanted list for embezzlement was detained at a Moscow airport Friday as he tried to flee the country, police said.
The unidentified senior official, accused of embezzling $125,000 from the country's defense ministry using forged documents, fled Azerbaijan to Russia in 2011 and had been hiding in a village in the Irkutsk region, Siberia.
The man tried to flee Russia soon after he realized that he had been followed by police. He was detained at Domodedovo airport where he arrived on a flight that made a stop there, police said.