article_snippet: Critics of Putin have in the past suffered miserable fates.
article_snippet: Business magnate Mikhail Khodorkovsky accused Putin of corruption and spent 10 years in prison and labor camps.
article_snippet: And before Business magnate Mikhail Khodorkovsky death, Nemtsov had been arrested several times for speaking against Putin's government.
article_snippet: The most recent arrests were in 2011, when Nemtsov protested the results of parliamentary elections, and in 2012, when tens of thousands protested against Putin.
article_snippet: Human rights activists did not mince words in assigning blame for Nemtsov's murder.
article_snippet: Tweeted Garry Kasparov, chairman of the Human Rights Foundation's International Council:
article_snippet: "If you are popular your critics don't have to be shot down in front of the Kremlin.
article_snippet: Putin is just food in a prison, eat it or starve.
article_snippet: a statement Human Rights Watch's Tanya Cooper said could prejudice the investigation.
article_snippet: Russia has become the kind of place where a top opposition leader can be murdered just steps away from the president's office," a top opposition leader wrote.
article_snippet: A country in which people are told to hate one another for difference of opinions is a dangerous country to live in.