Human rights activists want to put memorial sign in the place of Markelov's assassination

Russian human rights defenders, politicians and public figures ask Moscow authorities to set up a memorial sign in the place of the fatal attack on lawyer Stanislav Markelov and journalist Anastasia Baburova.

Markelov was shot dead on January 19, 2009. Anastasia Baburova, a journalist of the "Novaya Gazeta", who accompanied him, was wounded and later died in hospital.

Now, on the eve of the first anniversary of Markelov's and Baburova's tragic death, the Internet has launched a sign-in campaign under the open letter to Moscow Mayor Yuri Luzhkov asking him to address the issue of the memorial sign, the "Gazeta.Ru" writes.

The letter was already signed by human rights advocates Liudmila Alekseeva and Alexei Simonov, politicians Gregory Yavlinskiy and Sergey Mitrokhin, writers Dmitri Bykov and Nikolai Shmelyov, as Radio Liberty reports.

Human rights activists have also initiated an action in memory of the casualties on January 19 in Moscow. However, the Moscow Mayoralty refused to sanction the event. Human rights activists find the refusal illegal and are going to challenge the decision of the authorities in the court, the "Echo Moskvy" Radio reports.