The three men have been named as journalist Orhan Dzhemal, director Aleksandr Rastorguyev, and cameraman Kirill Radchenko. Dzhemal was a well-known war correspondent, who had been wounded while reporting from Syria; while Rastorguyev had been awarded multiple prizes for his documentaries. Russian embassy officials are currently traveling to the country to identify the bodies.

AFP initially reported that the men had been ambushed at a roadblock 23km from the central town of Sibut, located inside one of the world’s poorest and most unstable countries, which is divided between warring fiefdoms. A local police source told Interfax news agency that robbery was the suspected motive of the attack.

The nature of the journalists’ assignment in the CAR, which rarely makes international headlines, has not been officially confirmed. Aleksandr Venediktov, the chief editor of Ekho Moskvy radio; and Maksim Shevchenko, another well-known journalist who said Dzhemal was his closest friend, said the crew was reporting on the private Russian military company known as the Wagner Group.

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