The speaker of Russia's lower house of parliament refused a request Tuesday to hold a minute of silence in honor of murdered opposition leader Boris Nemtsov, state news agency RIA Novosti reported.
Speaker Sergei Naryshkin declared that the house had already sent its condolences to Nemtsov's family in the form of a telegram and thus there was no need to honor the request, which had been submitted by minority member Dmitry Gudkov of the opposition party A Just Russia, the report said.
Nemtsov, who was a deputy prime minister during the presidency of Boris Yeltsin and later became an outspoken opposition politician, was gunned down last month on a bridge outside the Kremlin. At that time, he had reportedly been preparing to release a report detailing Russia's alleged involvement in the Ukraine conflict.
Russian authorities have arrested several Chechen men in connection with the murder. Prominent human rights activist Andrei Babushkin said last week after visiting the purported triggerman, Zaur Dadayev, in jail that Dadayev appeared to have been tortured.
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