A Russian is said to have planned the murder of an opposition figure living in Germany on behalf of the Chechen government. The case is now before the court in Munich.
Six months ago, the verdict in the “Tiergarten murder” led to diplomatic complications between Russia and Germany. The Higher Regional Court in Munich is now dealing with a very similar case.
On behalf of the Chechen government, the Russian Valid D. is said to have prepared the murder of a German-based opposition figure and critic of Chechen President Ramzan Kadyrov, who is loyal to Putin.
“Charge of consenting to murder on behalf of the state,” writes the Attorney General in his statement. He also accuses him of preparing a serious act of violence that is dangerous to the state and of violating the weapons law.
Case reminiscent of Tiergarten murder
The case is similar to the “Tiergarten murder” in Berlin. A Russian man was sentenced to life imprisonment in mid-December 2021 for the shooting of a Georgian in August 2019 in the Kleiner Tiergarten park.
The verdict spoke of “state terrorism”: According to the judges, the 56-year-old acted on behalf of Russian state authorities. Russia has denied such allegations. The verdict led to diplomatic upheavals between Germany and Russia. Both states expelled several diplomats from the other country.
“In principle, the case is similar to the Tiergarten murder,” said Chechnya expert Miriam Katharina Hess from the German Society for Foreign Relations. “You can place him in the tradition of Russian contract killings in Europe.”
The act was obviously planned
The procedure is always the same, says Hess: the target is always someone who is critical of the Russian government or the Kadyrov regime. And then this regime looks for “a randomly selected person from the civilian population” who has no obvious connection to the Russian state apparatus.
According to the prosecution, the man now accused is said to have promised to commit the crime. According to the information, he obtained a firearm with ammunition and a silencer, found out the address of the victim and in the summer of 2020 spied on his place of residence. He was arrested before he could carry out the allegedly planned crime.
The exciting question now is whether the Munich Higher Regional Court will make a similar decision in the new case and also establish the explicit connection to Russia, as the Berlin court did.
Source: Stern
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