Four detained after Muslim cleric killed in Russia

Four people have been detained on suspicion of killing a top Muslim cleric and injuring another in Russia’s Tatarstan province, prosecutors said today.

Valiulla Yakupov, the deputy to the province’s chief mufti, was gunned down in the regional capital of Kazan yesterday. Minutes later, chief mufti Ildus Faizov suffered leg wounds when an explosive device ripped through his car.

Both clerics were known to be critics of the radical Islamist groups that have mushroomed in recent years in the predominantly Muslim Volga River province of four million people.

Mr Faizov has also been criticised by Tatarstan media for allegedly profiting from tours he organised for Muslim pilgrims.

The Investigative Committee said today that one of the suspects owned a company which organised hajj pilgrimages, and another one heads a religious institution in Tatarstan.