MOSCOW, April 19 (RAPSI) - Investigators opened a legal case against Alexei Beltyukov, the senior vice president of the Skolkovo Foundation, accusing him of embezzlement, the Russian Investigative Committee said on Friday.

According to investigators, between February of 2011 and February of 2012 Beltyukov illegally allocated $750,000 of the foundation’s money to Russian State Duma opposition deputy Ilya Ponomaryov.

“The misappropriation of such large sum Beltyukov attempted to conceal by having signed a number of agreements between the [Skolkovo] Foundation and Ponomaryov,” the committee said in a statement.

In line with the agreements, Ponomaryov had to deliver 10 lectures in various Russian cities and get a payment of $300,000 and also be paid $450,000 for a scientific and research work, the statement added.

On Thursday, police and Federal Security Service (FSB) officers searched the Skolkovo Foundation headquarters in Moscow as part of an ongoing investigation into possible embezzlement of millions of rubles by senior Skolkovo mangers.

A criminal case was earlier launched against former senior Skolkovo manger Kirill Lugovtsev and the head of the foundation’s subsidiary Skolkovo Innovation Center Customs Finance Company (TFK Skolkovo) Vladimir Khokhlov over their alleged role in the embezzlement of 24 million rubles (about $760,000) from federal budget funds.