Story By: Feza Uzay, Sub-Editor: Marija Stojkoska, Agency:  Newsflash

A Russian dad hunted by cops after he fled with his two kids aged one and six has been found dead in his car with the children dead on the back seat.

Fazyl Khalikov, 37, had grabbed the kids and fled from the family home in Ufa after a row with his wife Galia Khalikova in which he accused her of sleeping with a colleague after an office Christmas party.

Police said that they had got a call from the panicked mother, whose age was not given, after he refused to answer his phone, and then found a farewell note from him on 26 December.

Police managed to track his mobile phone heading towards the airport and then later had reports that he was in the Davlekanovsky district of Bashkiria, where he had been born and grew up.

An alert was issued to all police in the area and local media joined social media to try and find the dad and the two children, a daughter aged one and a son aged six.

Eventually, they had a report that a car matching the description was parked in a field, and when they arrived they found all three dead inside the vehicle.

An initial investigation indicated all three died from carbon monoxide poisoning which police believe was a suicide murder by the father using the exhaust gas.

However, a friend of the dead man rejected the idea that he would have killed his children deliberately and said he had probably left the engine running when he stopped in the field because he was tired after all the driving.

He said that the exhaust gas probably leaked into the car and that the death was therefore accidental.

He said: “The smoke from the muffler goes into the passenger compartment, the driver is warm, he does not notice it, but he does not wake up anymore. Most likely, the children fell asleep on the way; he was tired too and decided to nap. And this happened – they did not wake up. It was hardly a murder,”

The deaths are being investigated by the Ministry of Internal Affairs and the Investigative Committee.

Police have not confirmed yet what their standpoint is on the deaths and have only confirmed that the three that were being searched for had been found and that they were dead.

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