Thursday, September 2, 2010

Two men have been formally charged in connection with the assassination of former Chechen army commander Sulim Yamadayev in Dubai.

Yamadayev was shot dead in a parking lot at Jumeirah Beach Residence (JBR) in March.

Dubai Public Prosecution (DPP) said yesterday it had finished its investigation into the two men - Mahdi Lournia from Iran and Tajik national Makhsud Jan - who were arrested afterwards.

They have been charged with aiding and abetting in Yamadayev’s death and have been referred to Dubai Court of First Instance. The court has not set a date for an initial hearing yet.

Prosecutor Yousif Hassan Al-Motawa said: “We have been investigating since March to figure out the nationalities of the other suspects and how they committed their crime.

“All the evidence showed that the two suspects were part of the assassination of Sulim Yamadayev.”

DPP have demanded that the other suspects, including former Chechen deputy prime minister Adam Delimkhanov, are arrested by Interpol.

“We issued an international warrant through Interpol to catch the assassins and hand them over to us to investigate,” Yousif said.

In April, the head of Dubai Police, Lieutenant General Dahi Khalfan Tamim, said: “Adam Delimkhanov is the man behind the assassination of Sulim Yamadayev.”

Tamim said Delimkhanov was “wanted in the Emirates, and we will demand his arrest by Interpol”.

Delimkhanov has denied the accusation and threatened to take Dubai Police to court over the matter.

Three other men, a Kazakh and two Russians, are also wanted. Police say they left Dubai soon after the murder.

Yamadayev, a bitter foe of the Chechen leader Ramzam Kadyrov, was shot dead on March 28 outside his apartment complex in JBR.

ali.shouk@7days.ae