Britain has said it will follow closely investigations in to the killing of a prominent Russian opposition politician who was gunned down near the Kremlin.
Former deputy prime minister Boris Nemtsov, a leading critic of president Vladimir Putin and of the war in Ukraine, was hit by four shots from a passing car on the eve of a major rally in Moscow.
Mr Putin’s spokesman, offering the president’s condolences and saying law enforcement chiefs would oversee the probe, said the crime “has all the makings of a contract hit and is extremely provocative”.
Mr Nemtsov was reported to have warned in a recent interview that his life was in danger and other opposition figures accused Mr Putin of creating a climate of intolerance of dissent.
Pro-democracy activist and former world chess champion Garry Kasparov said on his Facebook page: “Shot four times, once for each child he leaves behind. A man of Boris’s quality no longer fit Putin’s Russia.
“He always believed Russia could change from the inside and without violence; after 2012 I disagreed with this.
“When we argued, Boris would tell me I was too hasty and that in Russia you had to live a long time to see change. Now he’ll never see it. Rest In peace.”
A Foreign Office spokeswoman said: “We are shocked and saddened by news that former Russian deputy prime minister Boris Nemtsov has been shot and killed in Moscow.
“Our thoughts are with his family and we offer our condolences to them. We deplore this criminal act. Those responsible must be brought to justice. We will continue to follow the situation closely.”
US president Barack Obama called on Russia’s government to perform a “prompt, impartial and transparent” investigation to bring Mr Nemtsov’s killers to justice.
Mr Obama said Mr Nemtsov was a “tireless advocate” for Russia and the rights of its citizens and praised him for fighting corruption.
The pair met in Moscow in 2009, Mr Obama said, when the Russian was willing to “share his candid views with me”.
“We offer our sincere condolences to Boris Efimovich (Nemtsov’s) family and to the Russian people, who have lost one of the most dedicated and eloquent defenders of their rights,” he said.
Hours before his death, Mr Nemtsov had been urging Russians to attend a protest rally and march in Moscow against the “mad, aggressive and deadly policy of war against Ukraine”.
“The country needs a political reform. When power is concentrated in the hands of one person and this person rules forever, this will lead to an absolute catastrophe, absolute,” he was reported to have told Ekho Moskvy radio.
Ukrainian president Petro Poroshenko said he was shocked by the killing and hoped those responsible for removing a “bridge” between the two countries would be brought to justice.
As an economic reformer, Mr Nemtsov served as deputy prime minister under the presidency of Boris Yeltsin in the 1990s, and enjoyed a successful spell as governor of a major city, but fell out of favour when Mr Putin took charge.