Said Buryatsky

Said Buryatsky was an Islamist militant leader in the Russian North Caucasus.

Buryatsky, whose formal name was Alexander Tikhomirov, was born February 10, 1982 in Ulan-Ude, the capital of Buryatia. His father was a Buryat Buddhist and his mother was a Russian Christian. He reportedly converted to Islam at the age of 15. He studied at a Muslim theological institute in Orenburg run by one of Russia's official Muslim Spiritual Boards, and then, from 2002-2005, in Cairo and Kuwait.

Buryatsky moved to the North Caucasus in late 2007 or early 2008, where he became an important ideologue of the Caucasus Emirate. He criticized Sufi Muslims, critics of the Emirate, and spoke out against the commanders who disagreed with Dokka Umarov.

Buryatsky was reportedly responsible for the reactivation of the Riyadus-Salikhin shahid brigade of suicide bombers originally formed by Chechen field commander Shamil Basayev. On March 2 2010 Buryatsky was killed in the village of Ekazhevo in Ingushetia during a Russian military operation involving units of the Federal Security Service (FSB) and the Russian Interior Ministry.