Gunmen shot dead a Russian federal judge in a North Caucasus province plagued by violence linked to an Islamist insurgency, authorities said today.
District judge Dzhulber Bykov was shot several times with a pistol outside his home in Kabardino-Balkaria last night, the regional prosecutor's office said. Police were searching for the unidentified gunmen.
Mr Bykov (46) was a police officer from 1984 to 2005 before he became a judge.
Kabardino-Balkaria is one of four provinces in Russia's North Caucasus that have had frequent attacks on authorities in the decade since federal forces drove separatists from power in Chechnya in the second of two devastating post-Soviet wars.
The Kremlin is battling a growing Islamic insurgency on Russia's southern flank, across the Caucasus mountains from ex-Soviet Azerbaijan, Georgia and Armenia - a strategic route for westward exports of Caspian Sea energy resources.
Violence has been more sporadic and less severe in Kabardino-Balkaria than in the North Caucasus provinces to its east but has been increasing.
Late last month, officials said security forces killed five militants holed up in an apartment building in the provincial capital, Nalchik.
Dozens of suspected militants are being tried over a brazen attack on police and government buildings that turned Nalchik into a war zone for a day in October 2005.
Russia's leaders have stressed the need for investment in the North Caucasus, where human rights activists say poverty, corruption and heavy-handed conduct by government forces fuels violence and drives young Muslims to turn to extremism.
Reuters