Russian opposition leader Shot dead in front of his 23-year-old Ukrainian model girlfriend'

Russian opposition leader Boris Nemtsov, 55, (left) was gunned down in a 'politically motivated' attack in front of his 23-year-old Ukrainian model girlfriend Anna Duritskaya (right), according to reports.

The former deputy Prime Minister, 55, and fierce critic of Vladimir Putin was 'under surveillance' by his killers before he was shot in the shadow of the Kremlin the day before an anti-Putin protest. He had been out for dinner with the young model at a restaurant inside GUM, a department store in Moscow's Red Square in the hours before his death, and the pair then went for a walk.

The married father-of-four was shot four times by assailants in a white car as the couple walked across a bridge over the Moskva River at around midnight on Friday, but the 23-year-old model was unhurt. His body (top) was taken away by police and hundreds of mourners have gathered at the site today to lay flowers and light candles.

A woman was seen crying at the memorial and people carried placards saying: 'Putin killed my friend'. Nemtsov had been working on a report presenting evidence he believed proved Russia's direct involvement in the separatist rebellion that erupted in eastern Ukraine last year. Just hours before his death, Nemtsov told Ekho Moskvy radio that Putin had pushed Russia into an economic crisis through his 'mad, aggressive and deadly policy of war against Ukraine.'


Photo: Credit: UK Daily