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wantkitteh writes:

The Guardian (and pretty much every other news outlet on the web) is reporting that Boris Nemtsov, former deputy Russian Prime Minister and critic of President Vladimir Putin has been killed in a drive-by shooting near the Kremlin, sustaining four gunshot wounds to the chest and dying at the scene. Nemtsov was due to lead a major opposition rally on Sunday. A spokesman for Putin has stated that the President will take personal control of the investigation into the killing, claiming it was "a pure provocation." A police spokesman has stated that a manhunt is under way.

Nemtsov was first deputy Prime Minister during Boris Yeltsin's presidency between March 1997 and April 1998. He wrote a number of reports linking Putin to corruption, spoke out against government inefficiency, criticized the Kremlin's policy towards Ukraine, and asserted that billions of dollars earmarked for spending on the Winter Olympics in his home town of Sochi had been embezzled. Several hours prior to his death, he promoted Sunday's opposition rally in Moscow on Ekho Moskvy radio. When he asked Alexei Venediktov, the editor-in-chief of the station, if he had any concerns regarding his appearance, Venediktov tweeted "It wasn’t me who needed to be scared."

While it's been a decade since a Russian opposition politician has been murdered in the capital, there has been no shortage of tactics used to suppress dissent against Putin's regime. Another organiser of the upcoming rally, Alexei Navalny, was jailed on 19 February for 15 days after handing out leaflets in public promoting the rally. Navalny was previously convicted of defrauding two firms of 30million roubles ($462k US) and given a suspended sentence in December, a move that critics say was an attempt to stifle political dissent.