MOSCOW, March 23. /TASS/. The killer of former Russian State Duma member Denis Voronenkov has died of wounds in a Kiev hospital, Public Television has said.

Denis Voronenkov was shot and killed at the entrance to Premier-Palace Hotel in Kiev. The chief of the city police force Andrey Krishchenko said the incident occurred at about 13:00 Moscow time, when Voronenkov walked out of the hotel in the company of his bodyguards.

At this moment an attacker wearing a ski mask and armed with a TT handgun approached him and fired several shots. A fire exchange between the killer and Voronenkov’s bodyguard followed. Both the bodyguard and the attacker were injured and taken to hospital. 

In December 2014 Voronenkov was stripped of his parliamentary immunity due to his involvement in a criminal case launched over a hostile takeover of a building in Moscow. In October 2016 Voronenkov emigrated to Ukraine. In February 2017 Russia brought official fraud charges against him and put him on an international wanted list.

The investigation 

The killer of former Russian legislator Denis Voronenkov carried a Ukrainian passport and the investigation is now in the process of checking whether it is genuine, Prosecutor-General Yuri Lutsenko said on Thursday.

"We are checking the documents, whether they were real. At this point we do not know for sure if he was a Ukrainian citizen. When we are certain we will tell you," he said.

Ukraine’s online periodical Obozrevatel (Observer) earlier quoted its own sources as saying that the killer had been wanted for creating a fake business and for money laundering.

According to the latest media reports he has died in hospital after suffering wounds in the chest and head.