Deputy Justice Minister Alu Alkhanov, a former president of Chechnya, will take over responsibility for overseeing the prison system from his dismissed colleague, Yury Kalinin, Kommersant reported Wednesday.

Kalinin, 63, had overseen the country’s overcrowded prisons for years but was dismissed by the Kremlin on Tuesday. Alkhanov, 57, told Kommersant that he would continue reforms begun by the Justice Ministry after Hermitage Capital lawyer Sergei Magnitsky died in pretrial detention.

(MT)