mount guard over a road. During their duty, they stopped an ambulance car transporting weapons and driven by Chechen Republic of Ichkeria brigade general Ruslan Khaikhoroev. During their attempt to examine the ambulance, all four soldiers were overpowered by a dozen Chechen rebels and taken prisoner. Initially, the soldiers were announced as deserters, and military police came to Rodionov's mother's home to search for her missing son. Only after the detailed survey of the checkpoint did military police discover traces of blood and evidence of fighting; the three missing soldiers then were declared missed in action and possible prisoners of war. Rodionov's mother, Lybov, went to Chechnya, but Rodionov's unit commander told her only that her son had been captured. Shamil Basayev promised to help Lybov to find her son. Only after paying a large sum of money did Lybov find the corpse of her son. It was revealed that on 23 May 1996, on Rodionov's 19th birthday, after more than a hundred days of torture, Rodionov and two other soldiers were offered renunciation of their Christian faith and conversion to Islam in order to save their lives. Rodionov refused to convert to Islam and even to remove the silver cross he wore. After that decision, he was beheaded on the outskirts of the Chechen village of Bamut by Chechen rebels. Ruslan Khaikhoroev, the murderer, accompanied by an OSCE representative, later admitted the killing, saying to Rodionov's mother, "Your son had a choice to stay alive. He could have converted to Islam, but he did not agree to take the cross off. He also tried to escape once." Andrey Trusov was beheaded; Igor Yakovlev and Alexander Zheleznov were shot dead. Rodionov's cross was given to St. Nicholas Church in Pyzhy. His body was buried in Moscow, at the Ascension Church near Satino-Russkoye village. Veneration Yevgeny Rodionov was posthumously awarded the Russian Order of Courage. There was a growing movement within the Russian Orthodox Church to canonize him as a Christian saint and martyr for faith. Some Russian soldiers, feeling themselves abandoned by their government, have taken to kneeling in prayer before his image. One such prayer reads: Thy martyr, Yevgeny, O Lord, in his sufferings hath received an incorruptible crown from Thee, our God, for having Thy strength he hath brought down his torturers, hath defeated the powerless insolence of demons. Through his prayers, save our souls. , religious icons