Five Chechens convicted of murdering Boris Nemtsov

Five Chechens have been found guilty of the murder of Russian opposition leader Boris Nemtsov in 2015.

Zaur Dadayev, a former soldier investigators say acted as the gunman, was sentenced to 20 years in a high-security penal colony, while his four accomplices received jail terms ranging from 11 to 19 years, CNN reports.

According to Judge Natalia Mushnikova, Dadayev initially admitted the killing but later retracted his confession, telling human rights activists it was made under torture.

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The four others all claimed innocence throughout the case, with one writing: "A LIE" in the condensation on the glass in front of him as the guilty verdicts were being read out, reports the BBC's Sarah Rainsford.

Nemtsov, a deputy prime minister to Boris Yeltsin in the late 1990s and a vocal critic of Russian President Vladimir Putin, was shot dead as he walked with his girlfriend in central Moscow in February 2015.

Investigators say forensic evidence found in the getaway car and telephone records linked the suspects to the crime, while state prosecutors claimed they had been promised a bounty of 15 million roubles (around £200,000) for the high-profile assassination.

However, defence lawyer Shamsudin Tsakayev told Reuters there was "incontrovertible proof" that Dadayev had not committed the crime.

Nemtsov's allies also said the investigation was a cover-up and that the people who had ordered his killing remained at large.

"For us, this is just the start," Vadim Prokhorov, the family's lawyer, told the Moscow Times.

"The shortcoming of this sentencing is that those who ordered and organised this crime are not in the dock," he said.

On the day of his assassination, Nemtsov gave a radio interview accusing the Kremlin of lying about Russia's military takeover of Crimea. He was also preparing to publish a report implicating Russian forces in the war with Ukraine.