An imam was killed in a village in the volatile Russian North Caucasus Republic of Dagestan, a spokesman for the republic's interior ministry said on Sunday.
Religious leaders are frequently the victims of militant violence in Russia's North Caucasus. Russian Islamologist Roman Silantev said late last year that around 50 moderate muftis have been killed for opposing Wahhabism.
"At midnight the imam of a local mosque was killed in the village of Karamakhi in the Buinaksk district. Investigators are heading to the scene," a source said without elaborating.
This is the latest murder in this year's series of imam killings in Dagestan. On June 14, another religious leader was found with gunshot wounds near the mosque in the village of Mikheyevka. The murder came several days after a Muslim theology professor Maksud Sadikov and his nephew were shot by unknown assailants.
In April, the former and current imams were shot dead near their houses Dagestan's Averyanovka village.
