ASTANA -- The Kazakh Interior Ministry says Kyrgyz citizens were involved in the recent murder of a Kyrgyz journalist in Almaty, RFE/RL's Kazakh Service reports.
Kazakh Interior Ministry spokesman Kuanyshbek Jumanov said today in Astana that although police discovered that several Kyrgyz were involved in the Gennady Pavlyuk's murder, he refused to comment on the alleged involvement of Kyrgyz secret service officers.
Jumanov added that Kazakh and Kyrgyz police have agreed to conduct a joint investigation into Pavlyuk's killing.
A team of Kazakh police investigators and members of Kazakhstan's Prosecutor-General's Office led by Lieutenant-Colonel Timur Stamkulov arrived in Bishkek on January 11 to help conduct the investigation into the murder.
Pavlyuk, 51, died in hospital on December 22, six days after he was thrown from a high building in Almaty with his hands and feet bound.
Kazakh media had quoted anonymous Kazakh police sources saying there were indications that three Kyrgyz secret service officers made an appointment with Pavlyuk and may have been present in the apartment from which he was thrown.
But Kyrgyz secret service officials accused the Kazakh media of disseminating false information.
Pavlyuk, an ethnic Russian, was the founder of the "White Steamer" newspaper and website and had worked for the newspaper "Vecherny Bishkek ("Evening Bishkek") and the Russian weekly "Argumenty i fakty."