Chechen blogger Tumso Abdurakhmanov, a vocal critic of Chechnya’s strongman leader Ramzan Kadyrov based in Sweden, has been reported killed nearly a week after he went missing.
“Tumso was shot at night by a group of people,” the Chechen opposition movement 1ADAT said in a social media post on Monday, citing its “network of informants” in Europe and Chechnya.
The Swedish authorities have said they were unable to comment on the reports of Abdurakhmanov’s killing, according to Swedish newspaper Aftonbladet.
Abdurakhmanov’s allies said he and his brother have not responded to calls and messages since last Thursday.
He was allegedly shot dead that night, said Radio Svoboda, a Russian-language affiliate of the U.S. news organization Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL), citing his associates.
1ADAT claimed that Abdurakhmanov’s brother Muhammad had been “hidden away by the intelligence services.”
Abdurakhmanov, 36, survived a hammer attack in Sweden in 2020 that he claimed had been ordered from within Russia.
A Swedish court sentenced a male suspect in that attack to 10 years in prison and a female suspect to eight years.
Swedish media reported that Abdurakhmanov had been living in hiding in Sweden since 2019 after being denied asylum in Poland.
He had lived in exile since 2015 to escape what he had described as threats to his life in Chechnya, a southern Russian region ruled by Kremlin loyalist Kadyrov.
Kadyrov, who has been accused of widespread rights abuses, has labeled opposition members “enemies of the people.”
Abdurakhmanov regularly posted videos highly critical of Kadyrov on his YouTube channel, which has nearly half a million subscribers.
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