Kremlin’s investigation: Murder of Russian journalists in Central African Republic was motivated by robbery
Russian investigators have concluded that the killing of the three Russian journalists in the Central African Republic (CAR) in 2018 was done with the goal of robbing them, said Igor Krasnov, deputy head of the Investigative Committee, as cited by Interfax.
“The established circumstances of the attack indicate that the murder was committed with the goal of robbery by residents of the CAR and adjacent countries who systematically commit severe crimes in this region,” said Krasnov.
On July 28, 2018, documentary filmmaker Alexander Rastorguev, war correspondent Orkhan Dzhemal and cameraman Kirill Radchenko visited the CAR capital of Bangui on tourist visas in order to shoot a documentary on the activity of the Russian private military company “Wagner”, which is also linked to the Russian businessman Yevgeny Prigozhin.
“The car with the journalists was stopped by a group of unknown dark-skinned armed people, who told them to get out and hand over their things, their cameras and video cameras. When they refused, the criminals shot the Russian citizens. The driver managed to hide,” said Krasnov.
Previously the Dossier Center received criminal case materials from the CAR National Gendarmerie. According to these documents, the local investigation established in August 2018 that the killing had been planned in advance (“This trap was set especially on the three Russians’ route”); the perpetrators possessed information about the victims’ itinerary; the murder was premeditated; the perpetrators were professionals. However, the law enforcement authorities have openly ignored this evidence.
The year after the tragedy, employees of M-Finance and M-Invest, two companies which also belong to Prigozhin, put forward a theory that the journalists were attacked by dozens of “Arabic-speaking bandits”.
Previously The Insider was able to make contact with Kirill Romanovsky, an employee of Prigozhin’s “Internet Research Agency” who gave the journalists the contact “Fixer Martin”. The investigators believe that it was with Martin’s help that the journalists fell into the trap. Romanovsky continues to insist on Fixer Martin’s existence, and that he himself is not linked to the murder.