MOSCOW, February 13 (RAPSI) – Russia’s Constitutional Court has ruled that officials can be dismissed for filing false income declarations, Kommersant newspaper writes on Thursday.

The decision was taken after Vyacheslav Vorobyov, a former officer in the FSB Primorye Territory Department, filed a complaint against his dismissal over “loss of confidence.”

In fact, he was fired because he had filed a false income declaration. Before appealing to the Constitutional Court, Vorobyov took his case to a lower court.

The law on corruption reads that officials, including military and security personnel, can be dismissed over loss of confidence if they file false income and property declarations. Vorobyov argued that this provision in the Military Duty and Military Service law runs contrary to the constitution.

The Constitutional Court has refused to hear his case, saying that dismissal for corruption-related offences can be used as an effective tool in the fight against corruption.

Kommersant writes that many officials have been dismissed on these grounds since the anti-corruption laws were adopted in Russia in 2008. Approximately 1.5 million officials file declarations every year. As many as 322 officials who understated their income on their declarations for the previous year were dismissed for loss of confidence in 2012 and 200 officials in 2013.