Chechen suspect in Nemtsov killing ‘likely confessed under torture’: rights council

A former Chechen police officer who admitted to taking part in the murder of Russian opposition activist Boris Nemtsov “likely confessed under torture”, a member of the Kremlin’s rights council said on Wednesday.

“There are reasons that lead us to believe Zaur Dadayev confessed under torture,” said Andrei Babushkin, adding he had seen “numerous wounds” on the body of the prime suspect in the killing during a visit to his Moscow prison cell on Tuesday.

Zaur Dadayev, a former deputy commander in a special Chechen police unit, was charged on Sunday with the brazen murder of Kremlin critic Nemstov alongside Anzor Gubashev who worked for a private security company in Moscow. They, along with three other suspects, were remanded into custody.

A court in Moscow heard the men were being probed under a section of the Russian criminal code relating to murders carried out for financial gain, in a sign investigators believe Nemtsov’s murder was a hit.

But Babushkin said Dadayev claimed he had made the confession under duress after being arrested in the North Caucasus region of Ingushetia last week, alleging that he spent two days manacled and with a sack over his head.

“They shouted at me all the time, ‘You killed Nemtsov, didn’t you?’. I said, no,” Babushkin reported Dadayev as saying.