• pub­lished: 28 Feb 2015
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Rus­sian op­po­si­tion politi­cian Boris Nemtsov shot dead on Moscow street a day be­fore first major an­ti-Putin protest in months Nemtsov, 55, was one of Vladimir Putin's fiercest crit­ics He was shot four times near Krem­lin while walk­ing with a woman, ac­cord­ing to Rus­sian news site Meduza Nemtsov had pub­licly ex­pressed con­cerns for his life ear­li­er this month Known as an eco­nom­ic re­former dur­ing his time as gov­er­nor of one of Rus­sia’s biggest cities, Nizh­ny Nov­gorod He had been due to take part on Sun­day in first big op­po­si­tion protest in months in Rus­sian cap­i­tal Putin con­demns mur­der, say­ing it may have been 'con­tract killing' A lead­ing Rus­sian op­po­si­tion politi­cian and a vocal crit­ic of Vladimir Putin has been shot dead on the streets of Moscow this evening. Po­lice cars blocked the street where Nemtsov was shot, and an am­bu­lance was also near­by. 'Nemtsov B.E. died at 2340 hours as a re­sult of four shots in the back,' an In­te­ri­or Min­istry spokeswom­an said. The 55-year-old was the first deputy prime min­is­ter of the late Pres­i­dent Boris Yeltsin dur­ing the 1990s. He had pub­licly ex­pressed con­cerns for his life ear­li­er this month and was out­spo­ken in his op­po­si­tion to Putin. Nemtsov was high­ly crit­i­cal of the gov­ern­ment's in­ef­fi­cien­cy, ram­pant cor­rup­tion and the Krem­lin's pol­i­cy on Ukraine, which has strained Rus­sia-West ties to a de­gree un­seen since Cold War times. An uniden­ti­fied as­sas­sin shot for­mer deputy Prime Min­is­ter Boris Nemtsov four times while he was walk­ing with a woman across a bridge near the Krem­lin. ‘Sev­er­al peo­ple’ got out of a car and shot him just after mid­night local time, ac­cord­ing to a source in the law en­force­ment bod­ies. Pres­i­dent Putin con­demned the mur­der and said it may have been a con­tract killing, ac­cord­ing to Rus­sian news agen­cies. Dmit­ry Peskov said the shoot­ing could also be a 'provo­ca­tion' as the op­po­si­tion has planned a big protest in Moscow on Sun­day. He said Putin had been quick­ly in­formed of the killing and that the pres­i­dent had ex­pressed his con­do­lences and or­dered the se­cu­ri­ty agen­cies to in­ves­ti­gate. Po­lice cars blocked the street where Nemtsov was shot, and an am­bu­lance was also near­by. He had pub­licly ex­pressed con­cerns for his life ear­li­er this month and was out­spo­ken in his op­po­si­tion to Putin. Nemtsov was high­ly crit­i­cal of the gov­ern­ment's in­ef­fi­cien­cy, ram­pant cor­rup­tion and the Krem­lin's pol­i­cy on Ukraine, which has strained Rus­sia-West ties to a de­gree un­seen since Cold War times. He had been due to take part on Sun­day in the first big op­po­si­tion protest in months in the Rus­sian cap­i­tal. He was known as an eco­nom­ic re­former dur­ing his time as gov­er­nor of one of Rus­sia’s biggest cities, Nizh­ny Nov­gorod. Nemtsov, who was Deputy Prime Min­is­ter of Rus­sia from 1997 to 1998 dur­ing Boris Yeltsin's pres­i­den­cy, was sen­tenced to 15 days in jail in Jan­uary 2011 after being ar­rest­ed at a New Year's Eve protest rally for 'dis­obe­di­ence to­wards po­lice'. One of Rus­sia's most promi­nent op­po­si­tion lead­ers, he was among 68 peo­ple ar­rest­ed at an un­sanc­tioned rally at a cen­tral Moscow square. Nemtsov and other protesters had gath­ered on the op­po­site side of the square from an au­tho­rised protest. He was sen­tenced for fail­ure to fol­low po­lice or­ders, the state news agen­cy RIA Novosti re­port­ed at the Se­cu­ri­ty and emer­gen­cy ser­vices se­cure the area close to the Krem­lin where Rus­sian politi­cian Boris Nemtsov was shot and killed on Fri­day. Re­ports in­di­cate that a white ve­hi­cle pulled up close to Nemtsov be­fore an un­known as­sailant un­leashed a se­ries of shots, hit­ting the for­mer politi­cian four times. Po­lice and emer­gen­cy ser­vices rushed to the scene of the crime, which oc­curred on Zamoskvoret­skiy Bridge near the Krem­lin’s Vasi­lyevsky Spusk. Nemtsov was pro­nounced dead on their ar­rival. Pres­i­dent Putin or­dered the Head of the In­ves­tiga­tive Com­mit­tee to take per­son­al con­trol of the in­ves­ti­ga­tion. Ac­cord­ing to the pres­i­dent’s spokesman Dmitri Peskov, Putin noted that the 'bru­tal' mur­der bears all the hall­marks of a con­tract killing and is of a pure­ly 'provoca­tive' na­ture. Rus­sia: FIRST SHOTS of Boris Nemtsov shoot­ing af­ter­math LIVE: Rus­sian politi­cian Boris Nemtsov shoot­ing af­ter­math Im­me­di­ate af­ter­math of Boris Nemtsov shoot­ing in Rus­sia (FULL VIDEO ) RAW VIDEO: Af­ter­math of Boris Nemtsov shoot­ing at Moscow Rus­sian op­po­si­tion politi­cian Boris Nemtsov shot dead on Moscow street a day be­fore first major an­ti-Putin protest in months Im­me­di­ate af­ter­math of Boris Nemtsov shoot­ing in Rus­sia