OSH, Kyrgyzstan -- Some 300 protesters have gathered in the center of Kyrgyzstan's southern city of Osh to demand the immediate release of a general detained last month for his alleged involvement in a high-profile murder, RFE/RL's Kyrgyz Service reports.
General Zamir Moldoshev, the former chief of Kyrgyzstan's Border Guards service, was detained on September 13 as a suspect in the 2009 killing of former presidential chief of staff Medet Sadyrkulov and his two associates.
The three were found dead in the wreckage of a car near Bishkek in March 2009, shortly after Sadyrkulov resigned to join the opposition to then President Kurmanbek Bakiev.
Officials initially maintained that the deaths were the result of a traffic accident.
But police said last month that Sadyrkulov was in fact murdered and that 17 people, including Moldoshev, had been taken into custody.
Deputy Interior Minister Melis Turganbaev told RFE/RL in September that a preliminary investigation revealed that Sadyrkulov and his associates were murdered in a summer house belonging to another former presidential chief of staff, Kurmanbek Temirbaev, and later placed in a car on a highway near the village of Koi-Tash.
The car was then set on fire.
Moldoshev is currently in a pretrial detention center in the Kyrgyz capital, Bishkek.
Osh Deputy Mayor Dastan Khodaev met with the protesters on October 13 and promised them that their request will be handed over to the government in Bishkek within a day.
Read more in Kyrgyz here
General Zamir Moldoshev, the former chief of Kyrgyzstan's Border Guards service, was detained on September 13 as a suspect in the 2009 killing of former presidential chief of staff Medet Sadyrkulov and his two associates.
The three were found dead in the wreckage of a car near Bishkek in March 2009, shortly after Sadyrkulov resigned to join the opposition to then President Kurmanbek Bakiev.
Officials initially maintained that the deaths were the result of a traffic accident.
But police said last month that Sadyrkulov was in fact murdered and that 17 people, including Moldoshev, had been taken into custody.
Deputy Interior Minister Melis Turganbaev told RFE/RL in September that a preliminary investigation revealed that Sadyrkulov and his associates were murdered in a summer house belonging to another former presidential chief of staff, Kurmanbek Temirbaev, and later placed in a car on a highway near the village of Koi-Tash.
The car was then set on fire.
Moldoshev is currently in a pretrial detention center in the Kyrgyz capital, Bishkek.
Osh Deputy Mayor Dastan Khodaev met with the protesters on October 13 and promised them that their request will be handed over to the government in Bishkek within a day.
Read more in Kyrgyz here
