A Russian prosecutor has appealed a military court's decision to clear an army colonel of criminal responsibility for killing a young woman while serving in Chechnya.
The court's prosecutor announced today that an appeal was lodged by State Prosecutor Alexander Derbenyov who is seeking to have the verdict overturned and a new trial launched.
The victim's parents have also appealed the New Year's Eve decision at the military court in Rostov-on-Don, southern Russia, to uphold a psychiatric evaluation that found that Colonel Yury Budanov was insane when he strangled Elsa Kungayeva.
Budanov, who admitted to the March 2000 strangling, was committed for treatment at a psychiatric clinic.
He is to remain in custody while the court considers the appeal, a spokesman for the justice ministry's sentencing department in Rostov-on-Don was quoted by ITAR-TASS news agency as saying.
The ruling provoked widespread protest from human rights activists, who said it effectively gave impunity to soldiers who committed human rights abuses during the much-criticized war in Chechnya.
Kungayeva's family had accused doctors of conducting a biased evaluation aimed at exonerating Budanov, the first high-ranking military figure to be brought to trial on such a serious offence since Russian troops re-entered Chechnya in October 1999.
AFP