DUBAI, (Reuters) – Dubai police accused a deputy prime minister of Chechnya of masterminding the assassination of former Chechen military commander Sulim Yamadayev in an underground car park.
The attack on Yamadayev, a foe of Kremlin-backed leader of Chechnya Ramzan Kadyrov, was carried out with a Russian-made gold-coloured handgun, police said, showing the media a picture of a weapon and a pair of black gloves.
Yamadayev was shot on March 28 in the car park of a luxury seaside apartment block in Dubai, one of seven emirates that make up the United Arab Emirates.
Russian analysts suggested his death removed one of the last remaining powerful opponents of Kadyrov’s increasingly strong control over Chechnya. Kadyrov’s spokesman has dismissed any suggestion that the killing was linked to the Chechen president.
“The leads in the case indicate that a top official in the Chechen government named Adam Delimkhanov, who is the deputy prime minister in Chechnya, is the mastermind behind Sulim Yamadayev’s assassination,” the Dubai police chief, Lieutenant General Dhahi Khalfan Tamim, told reporters yesterday.
“The crime … is 100 percent of Chechen making and it’s an operation of settling accounts (among Chechens),” Tamim said.
Delimkhanov said the accusation was a “provocation”.
“The Dubai police chief’s statements … aim to destabilise Chechen society,” he told Russia’s RIA news agency. “The (Dubai) police have failed to hold a professional investigation.”
“I am ready to cooperate with police … and answer concrete questions,” said Delimkhanov, who is also a deputy of the State Duma lower house of Russia’s parliament. “But I will also fight to bring them to justice for slander.”
Police said they were holding two suspects in connection with the killing and would seek an international arrest warrant for four others, including Delimkhanov.
