Index on Censorship » Oleg Kashin

Russia: Oleg Kashin defeats libel claim

Intern — Mon, 27 Jun 2011 10:09:40 +0000

Russian journalist, Oleg Kashin, has won the right to speculate about the identity of two men who beat him with iron rods. Kashin spent five days in a coma after he was attacked outside his apartmenton 6 November last year. The Kremlin’s youth policy chief, Vasily Yakemanko, filed a libel suit against Kashin, liberal newspaper Novye Izvestia and political analyst, Alexander Morozov, for reporting speculation that he might be behind the incident. A Moscow court ruled in favour of Kashin after it was found that Yakemenko had failed to prove that the accusations were factual statements.

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Russia: Disabled journalist convicted of libel

Intern — Wed, 10 Nov 2010 16:47:09 +0000

A Russian editor who was nearly killed in the attack two years ago, has been convicted of slander. Mikhail Beketov, who is confined to a wheelchair and can barely speak, has been found guilty of insulting the local mayor by the court in Khimki. He has been instructed to compensate damages by paying 500 roubles (100 British pounds). Beketov had been covering the plans to build the road through Khimki’s protected forest. Although the motorway works have been stopped, another journalist and an ecologist have been assaulted this month. Oleg Kashin, a correspondent of Russia’s well-known paper Kommersant, has been badly beaten with an iron bar on Saturday. Two days earlier, Khimki opposition activist Konstantin Fetisov had his skull broken after being released from police, where he was questioned about the protest. Mikhail Mikhailin, editor-in-chief of Kommersant said he is sure the attacks are connected to the articles written about the motorway. It has also been said that they carry the same signature. Before Beketov endured brain damage and lost his right leg and four fingers in the attack in November 2008, his car was set on fire and his dog was killed. Nobody has been brought to court.

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Russia: Reporter beaten

William Clowes — Mon, 08 Nov 2010 15:51:27 +0000

A leading journalist for the Kommersant newspaper was brutally attacked outside his home in Moscow. Oleg Kashin was put into an induced coma following the assault and police are treating it as a case of attempted murder. Kashin’s editor Mikhail Mikhailin has suggested that the assault was retribution for articles covering anti-Kremlin protests and extremist rallies. He had previously received threats from nationalist youth groups. The beating was so savage that he suffered a concussion and multiple broken bones.

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