Posted on 04/17/2003 9:59:04 AM PDT by NativeNewYorker
Moscow (dpa) - An unknown gunman shot and killed Sergei Yushenko, a member of the Russian parliament and a former information minister who was felled Thursday by numerous shots to the chest as he arrived at his Moscow home.
A pistol thrown away by the assailant was recovered near the scene of the shooting in north-west Moscow. Yushenko was shot as he exited his government car.
Police said they had no apparent motive for the killing. Last year Vladimir Golovlyev, who with Yushenko was co-chairman of the Liberal Russia party, was shot dead by assailants in a Moscow park.
Yushenko, 52, was information minister in 1993-94, and went on to serve on the defence committee of the Duma, the national legislature.
Ananova:
Putin critic murdered in moscow
Russian MP Sergei Yushenkov, an outspoken critic of President Vladimir Putin, has been murdered in Moscow.
His colleagues are calling his death an assassination.
Mr Yushenkov, a leader of the Liberal Russia party, was shot three times in the back near his home.
Police confirm he died later of his wounds and a pistol with a silencer was found near the scene.
A supporter of human rights causes and an opponent of the war in Chechnya.
Mr Yushenkov, 52, is the second member of his party to be murdered this year.
“I have no doubt at all that this was a political murder,” said Gennady Seleznyov, the speaker of the State Duma.
In August, party member Vladimir Golovlyov was shot in the head, and Mr Yushenkov said at the time that he thought that killing was politically motivated.
The Liberal Russia party was founded last year with the financial backing of Boris Berezovsky, a self-exiled tycoon and President Putin opponent who was elected one of its co-chairmen along with Yushenkov. Several months later, however, Liberal Russia broke ties with Berezovsky because of his political overtures to the Communists.
Mr Yushenkov, and a member of the Duma Security Committee, was a critic of Mr Putin and the Federal Security Service, the main successor to the Soviet-era KGB.
© Associated Press
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