A Russian journalist who had been critical of the Kremlin appears to have been assassinated after being shot several times in the back at his apartment building in Kiev.

Arkady Babchenko was going out to buy bread when he was gunned down on the staircase of his building, Ukrainian politician Anton Gerashchenko said.

The 41-year-old died in an ambulance on the way to hospital after his wife found him covered in blood.

Police, who said he had multiple gunshot wounds in his back, are working on the theory that he was killed because of his work.

"The first and the most probable version is his professional activity," Kiev police chief Andriy Kryshchenko said.


Detectives have been unable to speak to Mr Babchenko's wife because she is in a state of shock, Mr Kryshchenko added.

A drawing of Mr Babchenko's possible assassin has been released, showing a man aged been 40 and 45, with a grey beard and wearing a cap.

Image: Ukraine's interior ministry has released this image of the suspect

Investigators will look at "Russian spy agencies' efforts to get rid of those who are trying to tell the truth about what is going on in Russia and Ukraine", Mr Gerashchenko said.

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He wrote on Facebook: "Putin's regime takes aim at those who cannot be broken or intimidated."

Ukrainian Prime Minister Volodymyr Groysman said the "Russian totalitarian machine" had not forgiven Mr Babchenko for his "honesty and principled stance".

He added that Mr Babchenko was a "true friend of Ukraine who was telling the world the truth about Russian aggression... His murderers should be punished".

Image: People gather outside the apartment building where Arkady Babchenko was shot

But Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov said such comments were "sad".

"The Ukrainian prime minister is already talking about how it was done by Russian secret services." Mr Lavrov commented.

"An investigation has not yet begun... This fashion of conducting international affairs is very sad."

The Kremlin added that Ukraine had become a "very dangerous place" for journalists - and criticised Kiev for failing to protect them

Another well-known reporter, Pavel Sheremet, was killed in a car bombing in central Kiev in July 2016. The case remains unsolved but he was also a critic of Russia, Ukraine and his native Belarus.

UK foreign secretary Boris Johnson tweeted that he was "appalled to see another vocal Russian journalist murdered".

"We must defend freedom of speech and it is vital that those responsible are now held to account," he added.

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Image: Mr Babchenko was shot on the stairs at his apartment building

Mr Babchenko, a former soldier in the Chechen war, became one of Russia's best-known war correspondents.

He had been heavily critical of Moscow's annexation of Crimea, its alleged support of separatist insurgents in eastern Ukraine, and Russia's involvement in Syria's civil war.

He left Russia in February 2017 after saying he had received threats. He was concerned he might be jailed.

After moving to Kiev last autumn he had been working as a host for Crimean TV station ATR.

In April this year, news website Novy Den said its reporter Maxim Borodin died in hospital after falling from his fifth-floor balcony in Yekaterinburg, east of Russia's Ural mountains.

Mr Borodin had written about the death of people said to be Russian mercenaries in Syria. It is claimed they were from the Wagner Group, a private army Moscow is said to be using in Syria.