MAKHACHKALA, Russia -- A local physician and lawmaker has been gunned down in the Caspian port city of Derbent in Russia's North Caucasus region of Daghestan.
A senior aide to the director of the Russian Investigative Committee in Daghestan, Rasul Temirbekov, said on March 5 that Nasur Osmanov was shot dead at the doorstep of his house at about 9:30 p.m. on March 4.
Temirbekov added that investigators are looking into possible links to Osmanov's professional activities as chief of the Derbent District Clinic and as a member of the Derbent city council.
Daghestan and other regions in the North Caucasus are beset by violence linked to an Islamist insurgency rooted in two post-Soviet separatist wars in neighboring Chechnya as well as organized crime, political disputes, and clan rivalries.
Police and officials are regularly targeted in attacks.