Tens of thousands of people have marched in central Moscow to honour the memory of opposition leader Boris Nemtsov, who was gunned down near the Kremlin in the highest-profile assassination of Vladimir Putin's rule.
A sea of grim-faced supporters, holding Russian flags and Nemtsov portraits, marched in the drizzle from a packed Moscow square to the bridge over the Moskva where the 55-year-old was shot in the back shortly before midnight on Friday.
In what appeared to be the largest opposition gathering since anti-Kremlin rallies in 2011-12 brought more than 100,000 people into the streets, marchers honoured Nemtsov's memory while condemning Moscow's stance on Ukraine.
"These bullets are for each of us," read a huge banner at the head of the march while others stated "I am Boris", "I am not afraid" and "Propaganda kills".
"Stop the war" in Ukraine, said others.
Organisers put the crowd at 70,000 while police estimated it at 21,000.
Marching with his young son, engineer Alexander Akulin, dubbed Nemtsov's death "political murder".
"Political terror will intensify now," he warned.
US Secretary of State John Kerry, meanwhile, urged Russia to carry out a "thorough, transparent, real investigation not just (into) who actually fired the shots, but who if anyone may have ordered or instructed this or been behind this".
Around 6000 people, some wrapped in Ukrainian flags, also turned out in Russia's second city, St Petersburg.
"I am carrying a Ukrainian flag because he fought for the end of the Ukraine war. And they killed him because of that," said marcher Vsevolod Nelayev.
Hours before the killing, Nemtsov went on radio to urge Russians to join him at a Sunday rally in Moscow to protest against the Ukraine war and Putin's rule.
After his murder the protest was turned into a memorial march, with authorities approving a turnout of 50,000.
Elsewhere in eastern Europe, Nemtsov too was honoured.
In both Warsaw and Prague, mourners lit candles by his portrait and in Budapest people laid flowers outside the Russian diplomatic mission.
Nemtsov, an anti-corruption crusader and vocal critic of the government, was a former deputy premier in the 1990s under Boris Yeltsin.
He died after being hit with four bullets to the back while crossing a bridge a stone's throw from the Kremlin, in sight of the golden domes of Saint Basil's Cathedral. A woman with him was not hurt.
The spot where he fell was heaped with flowers, candles and notes.
Putin on Saturday vowed to punish the killers as Russian opposition figures denounced what they called a "political murder" and Western leaders called for a full probe.
The Investigative Committee, which reports directly to Putin, said Nemtsov "might have been sacrificed" to sow instability, and that they were also checking any links to the Ukraine conflict.
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