Posted March 24, 2017 11:54:41

Photo: Forensic experts and police officers examine the scene following the killing of Denis Voronenkov in Kiev. (AP: Sergei Chuzavkov)

Ukraine has accused Russia of "state terrorism" after a former Russian politician and key witness in a treason case against former Ukrainian leader Viktor Yanukovich was shot dead outside a hotel in central Kiev.

Former MP Denis Voronenkov was killed by an assailant who was armed with a pistol, police said.

The assailant was critically ill in hospital after being wounded by Mr Voronenkov's bodyguard, they added.

Mr Voronenkov fled to Ukraine last year and was helping the Ukrainian authorities build a treason case against Mr Yanukovich, Ukraine's pro-Russia former president.

He had also spoken out against Russia's annexation of Crimea in March 2014, although he voted for the move at the time.

President Petro Poroshenko said the killing "is an act of state terrorism on the part of Russia, which (Mr Voronenkov) was forced to leave for political reasons".

"Voronenkov was one of the main witnesses of Russian aggression against Ukraine and, in particular, the role of Yanukovich regarding the deployment of Russian troops to Ukraine," he said.

Russia called the allegation "absurd".

Relations between Kiev and Moscow are at an all-time low after Russia's annexation of the Crimean peninsula in March 2014 and the subsequent outbreak of separatist fighting in Ukraine's eastern Donbass region that has killed more than 10,000 people.

Mr Poroshenko said it was "no accident" that Mr Voronenkov was shot on the same day as a warehouse storing tank ammunition was blown up at a Ukrainian military base.

Moscow denies involvement

"We believe that all the falsehoods that can already be heard about much-hyped Russian involvement are absurd," Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov was quoted as saying about the killing.

Mr Voronenkov, 45, had been placed on a Russian federal wanted-list in connection with an alleged $6.55 million property fraud.

He came to Ukraine with his wife, opera singer Maria Maksakova, who was also an MP.

Photo: Ukrainian police say former Russian MP Denis Voronenkov (pictured) was shot dead on Thursday March 23, 2017, by an unidentified gunman at the entrance of an upscale hotel in Kiev, Ukraine. (AP: Roman Yarovitcyn - Kommersant Photo)

Mr Voronenkov was gunned down on his way to meet another former Russian parliamentarian, Ilya Ponomarev, who was the only member of the Duma who voted against the annexation of Crimea.

"There's an obvious theory - I've said that Voronenkov wasn't a crook, but a deadly dangerous investigator for Russian officials," Mr Ponomarev wrote on Facebook.

Television footage showed Mr Ponomarev and Ms Maksakova leaving the scene in a car together with Ukraine's General Prosecutor Yuriy Lutsenko.

Mr Lutsenko called the shooting a "cynical murder".

"He had provided investigators of the military prosecutor's office with highly important (witness) testimony for the case. This was a typical show execution of a witness by the Kremlin," Mr Lutsenko said.

Reuters

Topics: murder-and-manslaughter, world-politics, russian-federation, ukraine