GROZNY. Sept 25 (Interfax-AVN) - The assassination of Ruslan Yamadayev in Moscow on Wednesday was lawless and heinous, Chechen President Ramzan Kadyrov said.
"He [Kadyrov] was shocked to learn about this. He was really disappointed and was eager to know all available circumstances," Chechen presidential press secretary Lema Gudayev told Interfax on Thursday morning.
"It is well known that Kadyrov's principled position was that a court should find out what crimes the Yamadayev brothers have in fact committed and make a decision on their responsibility," Gudayev said.
"However, this extra-judicial killing, no matter who committed it, is heinous and lawless, for which someone has to be held liable as well," he said.
Gudayev suggested that some influential forces seeking to foment tensions in Chechnya could have been behind Yamadayev's killing in central Moscow.
"Kadyrov has repeatedly said in public that a thorough criminal investigation should be conducted in relation to the Yamadayev brothers, because they are suspected of involvement in a number of serious crimes," Gudayev said.
"The organizers of the murder could expect that this very subject would be brought up immediately after Ruslan Yamadayev's death," he said.
"The murder could have also been committed by avengers of blood, the relatives of those who blame the Yamadayev brothers for killing their people," he said.
Gudayev also did not rule out that some "third forces could have been involved, which are very influential and have certain material and financial resources."
"It cannot be ruled out that some forces, which are dreaming of coming to power in Chechnya, could have ordered this murder to try to cast a shadow on the republic's leadership," he said.
Ruslan Yamadayev was a member of the fourth State Duma.
Yamadayev was born on December 10, 1961. He graduated from the Russian President's Academy of Public Service and the Institute of Management and Business. He was also awarded with a title of the Hero of the Russian Federation.
Meanwhile, his brother Sulim Yamadayev, the former commander of the Vostok battalion, is facing murder charges.
Vladimir Markin, a spokesman for the Russian Investigative Committee within the prosecution system, had told Interfax in August that a criminal case on murder charges had been launched against Sulim Yamadayev and that he had been placed on the federal wanted list.
Yamadayev, "who was a brigadier general of the Armed Forces of Ichkeria [Chechnya], organized the kidnapping and murder of a Chechen businessman," Markin said.
The criminal case against Sulim Yamadayev had been launched by the Investigative Committee department for Chechnya on May 4, 2008, Markin said at the time. "The criminal investigation is still underway," he said.