Tikhomirova: Markelov's murder was not backed by professional militaries

Advocate Liudmila Tikhomirova, who represented at Yuri Budanov's trial the interests of Rosa Bashaeva (mother of the lost Elza Kungaeva), believes that the murder of advocate Stanislav Markelov is to advantage of "those who want discord between Chechens and Russian."

Ms Tikhomirova told the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent that she was "shocked by the  tragic death of Stanislav Markelov."

As she said, the Kungaev family addressed her after the information had appeared about possible conditional early relief of Yuri Budanov.

"They offered me to prepare a respective complaint; however, for objective reasons of overload I wasn't able to sign agreement on rendering legal aid. Then, the Kungaevs addressed Markelov, and he concluded such agreement with them," she said.

In Liudmila Tikhomirova's opinion, "it's hard to tell whether Stanislav Markelov's murder is connected with Budanov's case." "Markelov took part in many resonant processes. I don't think that the punishment of the lawyer was conceived as an intimidation act, as, for example, a complaint to the European Court on Human Rights could be prepared on behalf of the Kungaev family by a lawyer who lives outside Russia," she has added.

In her opinion, it is doubtful that "a professional military who had participated in operations in Chechnya could be an executor or customer of Markelov's murder."