KIEV, Ukraine (JTA) — Yuri Kaplan, an award-winning Jewish poet, was found beaten and stabbed to death in his Kiev apartment.
A neighbor found the Russian-speaking Kaplan, 72, in the apartment on July 13.
Most Jewish leaders and activists are saying the killing was not ethnically motivated.
Central Kiev police detained a young couple from Berdichev, a northern Ukraine town approximately 100 miles from Kiev, on the day Kaplan’s body was found. Police said they seized Kaplan’s belongings during the search of the couple’s apartment in Kiev, where they were living temporarily.
The couple remained in custody while police continued their investigation.
Among Kaplan’s many works was Babi Yar," although it did not achieve the renown of Yevgeny Yevtushenko’s poem of the same name.
Kaplan was buried July 16 in Kiev.
