A government official will be questioned over an attack on an environmental activist who opposed a controversial road building project near Moscow, a police source said on Friday.
On Saturday, police will interrogate Vladimir Strelchenko, the mayor of Khimki, a town on the edge of Moscow, over his alleged involvement in the attack on Konstantin Fetisov, who was set upon by men with a baseball bat last November.
Deputy Mayor Alexei Valov will go in for an interview later on Friday.
Last month, police arrested four suspects, including a Khimki administration official, who is suspected of organizing the assault.
Fetisov had protested against government plans to chop down part of a mature forest near Khimki to make way for a multi-lane motorway linking Moscow to St. Petersburg.
The project was given the go-ahead on December 14, three months after President Dmitry Medvedev put it on hold pending a full inquiry.
Activists want the road to be re-routed.
Fetisov was attacked two days before Oleg Kashin, a journalist with the influential Kommersant daily, was severely beaten by two men outside his home in Moscow. Kashin had also criticized the project.
MOSCOW, January 14 (RIA Novosti)