On this day Boris Nemtsov was murdered

Putin on the left and Nemtsov on the right

Op-d: A year on from the murder of Boris Nemtsov protesters marched in Russia.

On February 27, 2015, Boris Nemtsov, 55, was shot dead by an unknown person or persons and on February 27, 2016, protesters marched in a show of solidarity.

A planned rally on March 1, 2015, in Russia scheduled to be a protest against Putin and the powers that be in that country turned into a march to commemorate Nemtsov. His death came after he had appealed for protesters to join a march against Russia's involvement in Ukraine.

Nemtsov was deputy prime minister of the country under President Boris Yeltsin and opposed Putin and his government. He was to lead the 2015 protest which instead became a memorial to him.

He had reportedly previously received death threats.

The 2015 protest rally went ahead to commemorate Nemtsov with Russian officials granting permission for up to 50,000 to take part.

Nemtsov was in the vicinity of the Kremlin when he was killed by four shots in his back.

He and his Ukrainian girlfriend, model Anna Duritskaya, had just left a restaurant and were heading for his apartment when gunmen struck.

Mr Nemtsov was shot on a bridge around 23:40 (20:40 GMT) within sight of St Basil's Cathedral and the Kremlin.

The spot where he died has been made into a 'shrine' to commemorate the man and his murder. It has been vandalised and flowers removed many times so now a handful of supporters keep watch 24/7/

Fox News said "According to the BBC, footage airing on Russian television showed a white Lada Priora car in the area; still, there is no clear signal the vehicle was involved in Nemtsov’s murder. One part of the film shows someone running in the road alongside the Great Moskvoretsky Bridge and jumping into the waiting car, which then sped off."

The precise whereabouts of Duritskaya were not known and or the identity of who killed him or ordered his killing.

The killing was quickly condemned by US President Barack Obama. The finger of blame has been pointing at Putin and the Kremlin, an easy and obvious target.

Putin however has also condemned the killing vowing to catch the perpetrators.

Who killed Nemtsov will be a given in some people's minds but we should not easily or readily dismiss the idea of foreign interference.

It is quite possible Putin or the Kremlin or both were behind the murder but it is just as possible they were not.

Accusations that the opposition killed Nemtsov to make him a martyr seem too far-fetched but who knows in these volatile times.

Does Anna Duritskaya know who was responsible?

Voice of America reported "Putin, meanwhile, has pledged to find and prosecute those responsible for the murder of his prominent critic.  "Everything will be done to give the organizers and executors of this base and cynical murder the punishment they deserve," he promised in a note of condolence to Nemtsov's mother, Dina Eidman.

Perhaps this murder was simply a Kremlin ordered assassination or perhaps it was something else.

Time may or may not tell.

It did not take long for arrests to be made. Five men were arrested and in January 2016 the Daily Telegraph reported "Russian investigators have completed their dossiers of evidence against five men accused of murdering Boris Nemtsov, but have yet to identify who commissioned the contract killing or the motive for the assassination."

Saturday BBC News reports "investigators have identified the driver of an interior ministry battalion deputy commander as the supposed mastermind of the murder - but he has vanished without trace."

With allegations of witness statements acquired under torture the trial that will follow may fail to deliver justice.

Related:
Nemtsov: Kremlin-Watchers Find Eerie Parallel In An 80-Year-Old Murder

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