MOSCOW, December 31 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) - A Russian court exonerated from criminal responsibility for killing a young Chechen woman Tuesday, December 31, provoking protests from rights defenders at the collapse of the watershed military crimes case.

The military court in Rostov-on-Don, southern Russia, upheld a psychiatric evaluation that found that Colonel Yury Budanov was insane when he strangled Elsa Kungayeva and committed him for treatment at a clinic, Agence France-Presse (AFP) reported.

Budanov has admitted to strangling the 18-year-old woman in March 2000 while serving in Chechnya, but a psychiatric evaluation released earlier this month claimed he was insane at the time of the killing.

Deputy Prosecutor General Alexander Derbenev had asked the court to consider instead an evaluation carried out in summer 2000 that found that Budanov was responsible for his actions when he killed Kungayeva, and called for a 12-year sentence for the army colonel.

But the military judge presiding over the trial, Colonel Viktor Kostin, ruled that the latest psychiatric evaluation by Moscow's Serbsky Institute should stand.

Human rights activists expressed dismay at the ruling, saying it gave impunity to soldiers guilty of human rights abuses in Chechnya.

"The Budanov case was so clear-cut and yet the murderer has escaped punishment," Tatiana Kasatkina from the Russian human rights group, Memorial, told AFP.

"There is no hope any more for Chechens that the crimes of Russian forces against the civilian population will be punished," she added.

The Russian presidential human rights ombudsman, Oleg Mironov, also expressed concern at the ruling.

"If mentally abnormal, insane people command regiments and direct military actions in Chechnya... it is a very alarming symptom which makes one think of reforming our armed forces and looking for a political solution to the Chechen problem," Mironov told Moscow Echo radio.

The deputy chairman of the State Duma lower house of parliament's defense committee, Alexei Arbatov, warned that the decision to acquit Budanov of murder could derail efforts to normalize the situation in Chechnya.

But Budanov's lawyer, Anatoly Mukhin, defended the verdict as "legal and justified."

Army veterans who were at the courthouse shouted with joy and congratulated the defense team. Budanov was not present for the hearing.

Kungayeva's family had accused doctors of conducting a biased evaluation aimed at exonerating Budanov, the first high-ranking military figure to be brought to trial on such a serious offence since Russian troops re-entered Chechnya in October 1999.

"The military did not want to surrender one of their own. They got the upper hand and showed their strength. This amounts to an endorsement of illegal actions," said Kasatkina from Memorial.

A representative of the family, Abdullah Khamzayev, told AFP that they would lodge an appeal shortly with the military chamber of the Supreme Court and expressed confidence that prosecutors would do so as well.

Budanov abducted, beat, raped and murdered Kungayeva from a Chechen village on suspicion of being a sniper. He brought her to his military base, interrogated her and strangled her.

The investigation found that Budanov and three of his subordinates kidnapped Kungaeva at gunpoint from her home in Tangi-Chu and took her to Budanov's quarters. After he was alone with Kungaeva for about two hours, Budanov ordered his subordinates, who stood guard outside, to bury her naked corpse, Human Rights Watch said.

He had faced a maximum of 20 years in prison if found guilty of murder.

Prosecutors had thrown out a separate charge of rape against Budanov.