Timur Makhauri, a member of a Ukrainian volunteer battalion who fought in eastern Ukraine, was killed in a car explosion near the Besarabsky Market in central Kyiv on Friday, several people who knew Makhauri said in an interview shown by the 112.Ukraine TV channel from the scene of the incident.

One of these people who introduced himself as a friend of Makhauri's cousin said the man had served in the so-called "Sheikh Mansur Chechen battalion."

Another man who introduced himself as Makhauri's comrade-in-arms, said the latter fought in Donbas "with the Dzhokhar Dudayev battalion."

"This is Timur Makhauri. He used to belong to our Dzhokhar Dudayev battalion. He took part in the first and the second Chechen wars," he said.

Makhauri had previously survived several attempts to kill him, he said.

The man also insisted that the woman and the child who were in the same car were not Makhauri's wife and child.

One of the two men said later that Makhauri, a citizen of Georgia, had not recently been a member of the battalion and was permanently residing in Kyiv.

Interfax-Ukraine could not immediately obtain official confirmation of this information.

The Kyiv police department reported that a man sustained fatal injuries, a woman had her leg torn off, and a child was in satisfactory condition after the car explosion.

"The law enforcement received a report on the explosion of a Toyota Camry on Skoropadsky Street at 6:10 p.m. A team of investigators from the territorial and main police departments, units of patrol police, bomb disposal experts, and members of the expert service were dispatched to the said address. Law enforcement personnel are examining the adjacent territory and speaking with witnesses," it said.