Russia's Supreme Court on Tuesday ordered a second retrial of four servicemen charged with killing civilians in Chechnya, after lower courts twice acquitted them in rulings that provoked outrage from human rights groups.
The same court last year overturned an initial verdict by a military court jury acquitting Captain Eduard Ulman and his three subordinates of the 2002 killing of six civilians who included a woman and a teenager.
But a new jury summoned in May found the four, who have argued they were following orders by unspecified commanders, not guilty again.
The acquittals of the servicemen showed that Russian troops fighting separatists in Chechnya were able to abuse civilians without fear of punishment, victims' relatives and rights groups have said.
The May verdict has fuelled strong protests in Chechnya, where people blame Russian soldiers for widespread abuses of civilians in the Kremlin's military drive to crush the separatist rebellion.
"The acquittal of Eduard Ulman, Alexei Perelevsky, Alexander Kalagansky and Vladimir Voevodin is overturned because of violations of criminal procedures," Judge Alexander Koronets read out his decision.
He said the case would be sent back to the same military court to re-investigate and reconsider it under a new jury.
Human rights campaigners say charges that Ulman and his men opened fire on a civilian vehicle in January 2002 and executed the survivors were typical of a dirty war in Chechnya where both sides target civilians.
Only one high-ranking officer, Colonel Yuri Budanov, has been convicted for crimes against civilians during the 10-year Chechen war.
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