Kadyrov's Unlikely Victims

Philip P. Pan of the Washington Post has some better information on the married couple who were murdered in Chechnya yesterday.  Ramzan Kadryov's quote is breathtaking:  in explaining that he would have no reason to have one woman killed, he gives a reason why he would want Natalia Estemirova killed.  C'mon now, let's just try a little harder here.

She said Sadulayeva avoided political activism and never challenged the government. But Save the Generation's former director was found slain in 2005 after witnesses saw the security services take him away. A gunfight had taken place in an apartment he owned, but prosecutors cleared him of any ties to the rebels, Sokiryanskaya said.

Afterwards, a propaganda film broadcast on state television attacked Save the Generation as one of several groups receiving funding from international aid organizations determined to support the rebels, Lokshina said.

Sadulayeva's husband had served time in prison on charges of participating in an illegal armed group, friends said, but many men in Chechnya have been detained on such charges and it was unclear whether the arrest was linked to the killings.

Kadyrov praised Sadulayeva as someone who "was helping people in organizing their medical treatment and solving other humanitarian problems," contrasting her work with that of Estemirova, whom he said "was misleading society and writing lies."