Russian politician gunned down

Liberal Russian MP Sergei Yushenkov, a leading critic of President Vladimir Putin, was murdered in Moscow today

He was shot in the chest several times near his apartment. Moscow police spokesman Valery Gribakin said he later died of his wounds.

A tearful woman who identified herself as Yushenkov’s wife answered his mobile phone and said he had been killed.

The MP, who stood up for human rights and opposed the war in Chechnya, was the second member of the Liberal Russia party to be gunned down.

Last August, Vladimir Golovlyov was shot in the head, and Yushenkov said at the time that he thought the killing was politically motivated.

Yushenkov, a member of the Security Committee in the State Duma, was an outspoken critic of President Vladimir Putin and the Federal Security Service, the main successor to the Soviet-era KGB.

The Liberal Russia party was founded last year with the financial backing of Boris Berezovsky, a self-exiled tycoon who was elected one of its co-chairmen along with Yushenkov.

Several months later, however, Liberal Russia broke ties with Berezovsky, now fighting extradition from Britain, because of the tycoon’s political overtures to the Communists.