BERLIN (AP) — German prosecutors on Thursday filed murder charges against a Russian man accused in the brazen daylight slaying in Berlin last year of a Georgian man, and said that the Russian state ordered the killing.

The case last year prompted Germany's Foreign Ministry to expel two Russian diplomats, citing a lack of cooperation with the investigation of the Aug. 23 killing.

The victim, Tornike K., who has widely been identified in reports on the killing by his alias, Zelimkhan Khangoshvili, was a Georgian citizen of Chechen ethnicity who fought against Russian troops in Chechnya. He had previously survived multiple assassination attempts and continued to receive threats after fleeing to Germany in 2016.

On Thursday, federal prosecutors filed charges of murder and a violation of weapons laws against a Russian citizen they identified as Vadim K. alias Vadim S.

They said that, at some point before mid-July last year, “state agencies of the central government of the Russian Federation” tasked him with “liquidating” the victim.