MOSCOW, August 4. /TASS/. Journalist Orkhan Dzhemal who was one of the three Russian journalists killed in the Central African Republic earlier this week will be buried in the Moslem section of the Khovanskoye cemetery in Moscow but the date of the funeral remains unclear for the time being, journalist and political analyst Maxim Shevchenko, a friend of Dzhemal told TASS on Friday.

"Salat al-Janazah, the funeral prayer, will take place at the Moscow metropolitan mosque and Orkhan will be buried in the Moslem section of the Khovanskoye cemetery," Shevchenko said. "The problem is we don’t know the date."

He indicated that Russia’s Investigative Committee needed two days for doing the necessary forensic studies and they might last through to August 7 or August 8.

Shevchenko also said Dzhemal’s friends would be asking for permission to organize the funeral as early as possible.

The Russian Embassy in the Central African Republic, a country torn by internal strives, issued a report on the death of three persons near the town of Sibut to the north of the capital Bangui on Tuesday, July 31.

It said the journalist IDs issued in the names of Kirill Radchenko, Alexander Rastorguyev and Orkhan Dzhemal had been on the killed men.

UN officials said the men’s bodies had been found near a shelled car. They pledged support to the CAR authorities in investigation of the incident.

Alexei Venediktov, the editor-in-chief of the Echo of Moscow liberal radio told TASS the three-strong filming crew had come to the CAR to shoot a documentary.

The official spokesperson for the Russian Foreign Ministry, Maria Zakharova, gave the assurances that the families of the slain journalists would get all the essential assistance.

The Russian Embassy at the CAR said the bodies of Dzhemal, Radchenko and Rastorguyev would be brought to Moscow overnight to August 5.