Russian banks closing to protest murders.

MOSCOW - Many local banks will comply with a call from the Russian Banking Association to close their doors to clients for a day to protest the latest killing of a local banker, bank officials said.

In an appeal to President Boris Yeltsin, the Russian Banking Association pressed for a more active police response to the growing number of killings of Russian bankers.

On Dec. 2, Nikolai Likhachev, chairman of Rosselkhozbank, one of the country's largest commercial banks, was shot dead by an unknown assailant outside apartment building. He was the seventh Russian bank executive killed this year.

As Russia's economy has lurched toward capitalism in the last two years, organized crime has blossomed. Dozens of entrepreneurs and other businesspeople have been killed in what investigators have described as contract murders. Trade groups frequently have called on the government for more protection, but many wealthy businesspeople have hired personal bodyguards.

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