Azeri exile, Rahim Namazov, was injured and his wife killed in a drive-by shooting in southern France on Friday.

Namazov was an outspoken critic of the Azeri political leadership and served time in prison before seeking exile in France in 2010 with his wife and two children.

The mayor of Colomiers, the largest suburb of the city of Toulouse, told newspaper La Depeche that Namazov was a journalist who fled to France as a political refugee, and he was likely killed in “a settling of scores.”

Namazov said, in a video posted on YouTube in December, that he was jailed after writing stories about brutality against soldiers in units of the Azeri military. He said he had spent six months in solitary confinement.