MOSCOW, August 11 (RIA Novosti) - Russian President Dmitry Medvedev has urged steps be taken to trace those behind the killings of human rights activists in Chechnya, a senior Kremlin official said on Tuesday.
Zarema Sadulayeva, 32, and her husband, the head and an employee of an organization working with children affected by the Chechnya conflicts, were kidnapped on Monday and found dead in the trunk of their car this morning. Both had been shot in the head and chest.
The killings come less than a month after the murder of Chechen rights activist Natalya Estemirova, which caused outrage among Russian rights campaigners and concern from the international community over the safety of NGO workers in the troubled republic.
The unidentified official called the crimes against those who help people "brutal and despicable."
"Housing and roads have been built in Chechnya, and its economy and welfare developed. It is especially important at this time that those who do not want peace should not be allowed to discredit state authority and give people reasons to doubt its ability to ensure human rights and freedoms," the official said.
Tatyana Lokshina, head of Human Rights Watch in Moscow, said earlier on Tuesday that "working in Chechnya is now impossible for rights groups." "The level of risk is over the top," she said.
Chechnya's president pledged measures to uncover the crimes, saying it was a "matter of honor" to him.
"Bandits have been trying to sow fear and mistrust among people and to force society to give up efforts to rebuild the republic and force investors to drop projects in Chechnya," Ramzan Kadyrov said.
The mainly Muslim North Caucasus republic, which saw two separatist wars with Moscow in the late 1990s-early 2000, had achieved relative stability under Kadyrov. However, violence resurged in Chechnya and nearby republics in recent months.
A team of senior Russian investigators flew to Chechnya on Tuesday to help inquire into the murders, a spokesperson for the Prosecutor General's Office said.
