 | | 10-07-2006, 10:23 AM |
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| Investigative Russian journalist killed
Quote:
Russian journalist known for her critical coverage of the war in
Chechnya was shot to death Saturday in the elevator of her apartment building in Moscow, in a killing prosecutors believe could be connected to her investigative work.
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Anna Politkovskaya was a tireless reporter who had written a critical book on Russian President
Vladimir Putin and his campaign in Chechnya, documenting widespread abuse of civilians by government troops.
Prosecutors have opend a murder investigation into her death, said Svetlana Petrenko, spokeswoman for the Moscow prosecutor's Office. Investigators suspect the killing was connected to the work of the 48-year-old journalist, Vyacheslav Raskinsky, Moscow's first deputy prosecutor said on state-run Rossiya television.
Politkovskaya's body was found in an elevator in her Moscow apartment building, a duty officer at a police station in central Moscow told The Associated Press. Rasinsky said a pistol and bullets were found at the site of the crime. The RIA-Novosti news agency, citing police officials, reported that Politkovskaya was shot twice, the second time in the head.
Oleg Panfilov, director of the Moscow-based Center for Journalism in Extreme Situations, said Politkovskaya had frequently received threats. A few months ago, unknown assailants had tried unsuccessfully to break into the car her daughter Vera was driving.
In 2001, Politkovskaya fled to Vienna for several months after receiving e-mail threats alleging that a Russian police officer she had accused of committing atrocities against civilians was intent on revenge. The officer, Sergei Lapin, was detained in 2002 based on her allegations but the case against him was closed the following year.
"Whenever the question arose whether there is honest journalism in Russia, almost every time the first name that came to mind was Politkovskaya," Panfilov said.
Politkovskaya began reporting on Chechnya in 1999, during Russia's second campaign there, and concentrated less on military engagements than on the human side of the war. She wrote long, empathic stories about the Chechen inhabitants of refugee camps and Russian soldiers she found in hospitals — until she was banned from visiting those hospitals, Panfilov said.
More than any other Russian reporter, Politkovskaya has chronicled killings, tortures and beatings of civilians by Russian servicemen — reports that put her on a collision course with the authorities.
"There are journalists who have this fate hanging over them," Panfilov said. "I always thought something would happen to Anya, first of all because of Chechnya."
Politkovskaya fell seriously ill with symptoms of food poisoning after drinking tea on a flight from Moscow to southern Russia during the school hostage crisis in Beslan in 2004, where many thought she was heading to mediate the crisis. Her colleagues had suggested the incident was an attempt on her life.
She was one of the few people to have entered the Moscow theater where Chechen militants took hundreds of hostages in October 2002 and tried to negotiate with the rebels.
"Anna was a hero to so many of us, and we'll miss her personally, but we'll also miss the information that she and only she was brave enough and dedicated enough to dig out and make public, and that's a loss that I'm not sure can ever be replaced," said Joel Simon, executive director of the New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists.
| Investigative Russian journalist killed - Yahoo! News
This is such upsetting news. I urge you to get a hold of one of her books (A Dirty War profoundly touched my heart) and see what courage all journalists should aim for.
I hope she rests in peace and the person(s) who did this are punished. |
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