Yandarbiyev was assassinated after performing Friday prayers (AFP)

DOHA , April 11 (IslamOnline.net & News Agencies) – The trial opened here Sunday, April 11, of two Russian secret agents accused of the February murder of a former Chechen president in Doha , where he was living in exile.

The defendants, identified as Anatoly Bilashkov Vladimirvich and Vassily Anatolyvich Pokchov according to an Arabic reading of their names, stand accused of ten charges, including the February 13 assassination of Zelimkhan Yandarbiyev, reported Agence France-Presse (AFP).

They are also accused of attempting to kill Yandarbiyev's 13-year-old son and of smuggling arms into Qatar , according to the formal accusations read out in court by a representative of the prosecutor general.

Quoting “confessions by the accused”, the representative also said that “the arms used in the killing came via the Saudi-Qatari border in a diplomatic car”.

The first attempt to kill Yandarbiyev on February 6 failed because he was delayed in the mosque after Friday prayers, the representative added.

The next hearing was set for April 25 when witnesses will be called to testify in order to allow the defense to review the case.

In accordance with Qatari law, “only Arab lawyers can participate in pleading before the court,” a judicial source said.

However, lawyers from those countries that have a reciprocal agreement with Qatar , which allows lawyers from the Gulf state to take part in court hearings abroad, can also go before a Qatari court, the source added.

In what has escalated into a diplomatic row between the tiny Gulf emirate and Russia , Qatar expelled the first secretary of the Russian embassy late last month after detaining him and the agents in connection with the murder Yandarbiyev in a car bomb.

Qatar 's expulsion announcement was made just hours after the return to Doha of two Qatari nationals who were released by Moscow .

The two members of the Gulf state's wrestling federation were arrested in transit at Moscow 's Sheremetyevo airport on February 26 on suspicion of carrying undeclared foreign currency.

Their detention followed Doha 's arrest of the two Russian intelligence agents accused to have murdered the 51-year-old Chechen leader and badly wounded his son in the explosion outside a mosque.