BRUSSELS, August 13 (RIA Novosti) - The European Union has condemned the murder of the head of a children's organization operating in Chechnya and her husband and has urged Moscow to ensure the safety of such activists, the EU presidency said.
"The EU condemns the murders of the human rights defender Zarema Sadulayeva and her husband Alik Dzhabrailov in Chechnya on August 10 and expresses its solidarity with the families of the victims," the Swedish EU presidency said in a statement.
"It is important that an investigation into these latest murders is conducted promptly, transparently and thoroughly," the EU said, adding that Russia needed "to do everything in their power to ensure the protection of human rights defenders."
Zarema Sadulayeva, 32, of Let's Save the Generation, an organization working with children affected by the Chechnya conflicts, and her husband, Alik Dzhabrailov, 33, who also worked for the group, were kidnapped on Monday and found dead in the trunk of their car early on Tuesday. Both had been shot in the head and chest.
The EU said it was concerned by recent deaths of a number of activists in Russia and Chechnya and pointed to the slaying of Natalya Estemirova, who was abducted and shot dead in similar circumstances last month.
The EU said the two murders follow "a series of killings of human rights defenders in Russia, including Anna Politkovskaya in 2006, Stanislav Markelov in January 2009 and Natalya Estemirova on 15 July 2009."
Chechnya's president Ramzan Kadyrov suggested on Tuesday the killings might have been revenge-related as Dzhabrailov was at one time a member of a militant group and served a four-year prison sentence.
