Germany’s chief public prosecutor suspects Russian intelligence agencies to be behind the killing of Zelimkhan Khangoshvili, a former Chechen insurgent in Berlin and plans to take over investigations into the case, various German media outlets have reported.

Coming three months after Georgian citizen Zelimkhan Khangoshvili, 40, was shot in broad daylight in a Berlin park on August 23, such a move would amount to the German state officially accusing the Kremlin of carrying out a political assassination on German soil and likely lead to a similar diplomatic fall-out as over the poisoning of Sergei Skripal in the UK in March 2018.

According to a report by Der Spiegel on Tuesday, Germany’s highest general prosecutor in Karlsruhe decided to take on the case after forensics experts identified the assassin as the same person, Vadim Krasikov, who was sought over the murder of a Russian businessman in 2013.

The Kremlin has until now categorically denied its involvement in the murder, and some German officials initially mooted the Moscow link could be a red herring planted to sow discord between Russia and Europe. But the Russian government’s unwillingness to illuminate the case raised suspicions.