Citing reliable sources, Izvestia said counterintelligence director Sergei Stepashin sent a letter to President Boris Yeltsin outlining the identity of the suspect, including the fact that he is a member of the army's elite paratrooper forces. Izvestia said that the newspaper's editors also know the suspect's name, but will not print it.
Izvestia said presidential sources denied the existence of such a letter. Kholodov was killed by a bomb enclosed in a package he picked up at a Moscow train station. The package allegedly contained information for an investigative story Kholodov was writing on corruption in the army's Western Group.
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