OMON officers unanimously supported Colonel Sergei Yevtikov, head of the city's 2nd battalion, at a staff meeting Tuesday, the Moscow police force said in a furious statement posted on its web site, Petrovka-38.org.

"Police Colonel Yevtikov has received 27 awards, including the Order of Courage and honorary weapons. He enjoys the authority and respect of his units," the statement said, citing a motion adopted at the meeting.

Even the motion sparked controversy, with news reports saying some signatures on the motion had been falsified.

Yevtikov, speaking later on Ekho Moskvy radio, denied the claims, explaining that "some declarations were made without full names but with handwritten signatures."

Yevtikov is under the spotlight after the New Times magazine published a report Monday that said the Moscow OMON is riddled with corruption like officers working on the side as security guards for businesses and organized crime. The report was based on accounts from current and former OMON officers.

The Interior Ministry has promised to investigate the allegations, but Moscow police have downright rejected them as slander from former officers fired for various offenses.

"The Moscow OMON has never ducked difficulties. That is why today we decided to react to those who attempt to cover our units with dirt," the Moscow police statement said Tuesday.

To protect "the honor and accomplishments of the force and Colonel Yevtikov, the police will file a lawsuit against the magazine," the statement said.

The New Times said it was not worried about a possible lawsuit. "It is their right to defend their honor, and it is our right to give people a chance to tell the truth," publisher Irena Lesnyevskaya told Ekho Moskvy.

Lesnyevskaya stressed that all the conversations with the officers had been recorded.

The whistleblowers' report was highly unusual because they named their battalion commander, Yevtikov, whom they accused of taking bribes from moonlighting subordinates, among other things.

Some officers appealed to the magazine after they got no reaction to written complaints sent to the Kremlin.

President Dmitry Medvedev has promised to reform the country's law enforcement and to liberalize the criminal justice system.

Two of the signatories of the letters to the Kremlin, former OMON officers Sergei Taran and Alexei Volnushkin, lost an appeal to be reinstated in their jobs Tuesday. The Moscow court took just 10 minutes to throw out the appeal, the Gazeta newspaper reported on its web site.

New Times reporter Nikita Aronov, who co-authored the critical article, said Tuesday that he knew that some of his informants had been fired. "We did not write this so that we would not jeopardize their legal situation," he told The Moscow Times.

The magazine had suggested earlier that all the whistleblowers' dismissals were backdated.

The corruption scandal is unfolding as the OMON police face larger public protests that reflect growing frustration with the country's leaders.

On Sunday, OMON forces in Moscow dispersed an unsanctioned rally of human rights protesters, detaining more than 100 people. On Saturday, up to 12,000 protesters in Kaliningrad called on Prime Minister Vladimir Putin to resign at a peaceful rally.