MOSCOW: Investigators yesterday said that they had solved one of Russia’s most notorious killings and had arrested a man and a woman for the murders of the human rights lawyer Stanislav Markelov and the journalist Anastasia Baburova. Markelov — a friend of the assassinated journalist Anna Politkovskaya — and Baburova were gunned down in January in central Moscow. They had been walking towards the metro when a hitman shot Markelov in the back of the head. Baburova may have tried to grab the assassin and was also shot, dying in hospital. Yesterday Russia’s federal security service (FSB) named their killers as Eugenia Khasis, 24, and Nikita Tikhonov, 29. While Khasis appears to have no previous convictions, Tikhonov is a veteran neo-Nazi activist wanted in connection with the murder of an anti-fascist campaigner. News of the arrests came as the human rights group Memorial said gunmen loyal to Chechnya’s pro-Kremlin president had abducted an activist in Moscow and flown him to Chechnya. Chechen security officials grabbed Arbi Khachukayev yesterday afternoon and then bundled him on to a flight to Grozny, Memorial said.