Russian security forces detained two suspects in connection with the Moscow slaying of opposition politician Boris Nemtsov after Russian President Vladimir Putin accented the importance of investigating what he called a “brazen” crime.
Two men from the Caucasus region were seized as suspects, Russian Federal Security Service Director Alexander Bortnikov said yesterday in a broadcast on state broadcaster Rossiya 24.
Putin has been informed, he added.
Nemtsov, 55, a Russian politician and critic of Putin’s regime, was shot dead on a bridge near the Kremlin late on Feb. 27, raising concerns over civil freedoms in the nation.
The apparent murder prompted more than 50,000 people to hold a vigil in Moscow on Sunday last week, while top officials and business leaders attended his funeral last week.
Putin told Russian law enforcement on Wednesday last week to guard against extremist threats to the state aimed at provoking conflict similar to the crisis in Ukraine.
Russia must rid itself of the “shame and tragedy” of killings “right in the center of the capital,” he said.
The detainees were identified as Anzor Gubashev and Zaur Dadaev, and are suspected of planning and carrying out the killing, Russia’s Investigative Committee said on its Web site.
The service and the Russian Ministry of Internal Affairs continue to search for other people linked to the murder, it said.
“It is difficult to judge whether these are the real executors of the killing, or if investigators have been put on the wrong scent,” Nemtsov ally Ilya Yashin said in a statement on Facebook following the arrests.
Yashin added that high-ranking officials who criticized Nemtsov in recent years should be probed.
The probe into Nemtsov’s slaying might lead abroad, Interfax reported on Saturday, citing an unidentified Russian official familiar with the situation.
Putin’s nationalist allies said last week that the US might have been behind the death.
Russia’s liberal opposition has been struggling to gain traction against the backdrop of nationalistic fervor whipped up by the conflict in Ukraine and high public approval of Putin.
Of the movement’s leaders, Alexey Navalny has recently served a 15-day jail term for handing out pamphlets and Mikhail Khodorkovsky is in self-exile after a decade in prison.
Putin, 62, has cracked down on political foes since he was first elected in 2000, stamping out opposing voices in parliament and tightening the state’s control over media.
He increased regulation of the Internet and non-governmental organizations after protests three years ago.
Nemtsov’s allies blame the government for creating a climate that led to the killing.
“Bortnikov said security forces have evidence of their guilt, including camera recordings from the site,” Yashin said. “We will be striving for this evidence to be made public.”
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