[JURIST] Two Russian prosecutors were convicted Monday of accepting a $10,000 bribe from a construction company in the country's latest example of corruption in the court and police systems. Sergei Kocherov and Ruslan Fedosenko of the district prosecutor's office in Moscow were sentenced to four years in a maximum security prison, while lawyers for the two said they plan to appeal. The convictions come a week after Russian President Vladimir Putin [official website] called for greater efforts in fighting corruption [speech text], which has increased substantially since he took office in 2000.

Transparency International [advocacy website], an anti-corruption advocacy group, has reported that incidents of corrupt activity may be up to seven times more prevalent than they were in 2001. Bribes totaling $240 billion are taken by corrupt officials in Russia [JURIST news archive] on a yearly basis, according to a report by a senior Russian prosecutor earlier this month. AP has more.