Russian editor dies after attack

June 30th, 2009

Anna Politkovskaya: retrial must hear new evidence

June 26th, 2009

The family of the slain journalist has called for the retrial of those accused of involvement in her murder to include a comprehensive new investigation. Maria Eismont reports
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Politkovskaya murder case set for retrial

June 25th, 2009

Glasnost Defence Foundation (GDF)

May 20th, 2009

The Glasnost Defence Foundation is a non-profit organisation that defends journalists, journalism, and the freedom of expression in Russia. The foundation identifies and records all individual cases of journalists’ rights violations in Russia.

Centre for Journalism in Extreme Situations (CJES)

May 20th, 2009

The Centre for Journalism in Extreme Situations is a human rights organisation created to assist the establishment and realization of freedom for mass information and the strengthening of the legal basis for all actors in the arena of mass information. CJES aims to protect journalists’ rights and freedoms.

Orlando Figes: a victory for Russian history

May 14th, 2009

A St Petersburg court has confirmed that the police raid on Gulag archive Memorial was illegal
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Lebedev’s standards

May 12th, 2009

Is the Evening Standard headed for the same fate as Alexander Lebedev’s under-resourced Russian newspaper, Novaya Gazeta? Andrei Soldatov reports
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Russia’s re-education

March 3rd, 2009

My history book is the latest victim of the Kremlin’s attempts to rehabilitate the Soviet Union, says Orlando Figes
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Anna Politkovskaya: no justice

February 19th, 2009

The acquittals in the Anna Politkovskaya murder case highlight a culture of impunity that must be brought to an end, writes
Tanya Lokshina
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Politkovskaya accused acquitted

February 19th, 2009

Neo-Nazis threaten Russian research centre

February 12th, 2009

Russia: editor beaten

February 4th, 2009

Yet another journalist has been brutally attacked in Russia. Maria Eismont reports
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Medvedev to revise treason bill

January 29th, 2009

Just another two murders in Moscow?

January 23rd, 2009

Bill Bowring looks at the possible motives behind the murder of Anastasiya Baburova and Stanislav Markelov
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Russia: crimes without punishment

January 21st, 2009

The murder of Anastasiya Baburova (right) and Stanislav Markelov is part of a brutal trend. Russians who stand up for human rights may pay with their lives, says Tanya Lokshina

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Novaya Gazeta reporter shot

January 19th, 2009

Editor’s pick 2008: Matthew Bown

January 2nd, 2009

A return to law and order, national pride and upright morals is colliding with Russia’s exuberant and scandal-seeking art world, writes Matthew Bown for Index on Censorship magazine’s Amnesty award-winning ‘How Free is the Russian Media’ issue.

Read here

An open letter to President Medvedev

December 8th, 2008

Memorial’s historical archive must be restored immediately. An open letter from Orlando Figes and some of the world’s leading academics
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Politkovskaya: slim hope for justice

November 28th, 2008

Oleg Panfilov assesses the twists and turns of the investigation into Anna Politkovskaya’s murder and considers the chances of a fair trial
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Rouble trouble hits Russian media

November 27th, 2008

While the Anna Politkovskaya murder trial descends into farce, her newspaper, Novaya Gazeta, is cutting reporting staff. Is there more to the move than the financial crisis, asks Maria Eismont
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Russian journalist severely beaten

November 18th, 2008

Politkovskaya lawyer poison claim

October 15th, 2008

Russia: freedom of belief under threat

October 14th, 2008

The gravest danger to religious freedom in Russia comes from the Kremlin’s approach to combating extremism, writes Geraldine Fagan of Forum 18
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Anna Politkovskaya: unanswered questions

October 7th, 2008

Three men are facing trial for the murder of Russian journalist Anna Politkovskaya, but the investigation is far from over. Index on Censorship reports

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Russia: free speech stalemate

September 19th, 2008

Meeting Garry Kasparov and President Medvedev on a recent trip, John Kampfner found little cause for optimism

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Ingushetiya: further killing as Yevloyev family declares vendetta

September 12th, 2008

Report on Yevlovev murder pulled from Russian TV

September 10th, 2008

TV crew detained in South Ossetia

September 9th, 2008

Murder in Ingushetiya

September 4th, 2008

The death of Magomed Yevloyev is a terrifying and tragic blow to freedom of expression in Russia, writes Maria Eismont

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Ingushetian opposition website owner killed

September 1st, 2008

Media casualties increase in Georgian conflict

August 13th, 2008

Four charged in Politkovskaya investigation

June 19th, 2008

Russia: Extreme reaction

May 2nd, 2008

The Russian authorities are taking a heavy-handed approach to web monitoring, writes Maria Eismont

‘Error. The website you’ve requested either doesn’t exist, or is overloaded.’ This announcement greeted visitors to the electronic version of Russian independent regional weekly Vyatskiy Nablyudatel, a Kirov newspaper well known for its editorial independence and investigative enterprise, after its website was closed by its Internet provider on April 22. Khostingoviye telesistemi, the Moscow-based ISP, claimed it received an official letter from the Kirov regional police department saying the website contained ‘extremist’ opinion in the readers’ forum, insulting the vice-governor and the government of the region. ‘If you are the owner of this site and think this is a mistake please contact the technical support service,’ continued the announcement on the website.

The law on ‘counteracting extremist activity’ has broadened the definition of extremism to include media criticism of public officials, and carries a custodial sentence of up to three years for journalists, along with the suspension or closure of their publication. It was passed by parliament despite protests from human rights groups, who claimed that the vague language of the law would allow public officials to interpret it widely and use it to target their critics. The Russian prosecutor’s office is currently calling for the Internet to be placed under the same rules as print media.
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New curbs on Russian media

April 25th, 2008

Union confusion

March 28th, 2008

Is Chechnya’s President Kadyrov welcome in the country’s journalists’ union or not, asks Anna Sevortian

On the 5 March Ramzan Kadyrov, the president of Chechnya, was inducted into the Union of Journalists of Chechnya, which is part of the Russian Union of Journalists. How can a serving politician, who is not a journalist, become a member? This question was asked by the many posts and press reports that inundated the web. Several well-known journalists announced they would cancel their membership if the information proved to be true. It did.

Kadyrov was given membership for his service to  journalism in the Chechen Republic and ’securing optimal conditions for the independent operation of the press’. He got his certificate and union ID from his minister of external relations and press, Shamsail Saraliev.

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The future of the Russian media

March 11th, 2008

On 4 March, to mark the publication of its latest issue, ‘How Free is the Russian Media?’, Index on Censorship hosted a discussion in London and Moscow on the future of the Russian media under President Medvedev. The discussion featured John Kampfner, Arkady Babchenko (author of One Soldier’s War in Chechnya), Maria Eismont (New Eurasia Foundation, Moscow), Alexander Verkhovsky (Sova Centre, Moscow), Natalia Rostova (Novaya Gazeta), Oleg Panfilov (Centre for Journalism in Extreme Situations), Maria Yulikova (Carnegie Centre) and Sergei Bachinin (Vyatsky Nablyudatel’) and Anna Sevortian (Centre for Development of Democracy).

The event was supported by the Open Society Foundation and the Royal Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Norway.

Russia: Elections of the absurd

December 20th, 2007

Coverage of the recent Duma poll and forthcoming presidential race suggests that Russian media increasingly only functions to endorse the government line, writes Oleg Panfilov

On 12 December, Vladimir Putin had an official meeting with the Chairman of the Central Election Commission, Vladimir Churov, and with the chairmen of several regional election commissions. The president offered his congratulations with regard to the Constitution Day and thanked them for the ‘highly professional work’ done during the campaign season of the State Duma elections.

The Central Election Commission is an officially independent organisation, so this meeting, and many others like it, could be viewed with some surprise. However, the reality is that Russians are not surprised or worried about this in the slightest. Political aggression from President Putin’s supporters has long been the norm, and it does not seem to upset anyone. On the contrary, such behaviour is widely welcomed, as many regard Putin’s actions to be an expression of masculine power, supreme courage and strong arm tactics.

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Russia: Protesters under pressure

November 30th, 2007

Vladimir Putin is ultimately responsible for last weekend’s oppression of political demonstrations, writes Oksana Chelysheva

There are two Russias nowadays. One is of Putin, with his images on every other bill board, trying hard to crush, scare and harass the other, democratic Russia.

Late Sunday evening I spoke by phone with Ella Poliakova, the chair of Soldiers’ Mothers’ Committee of Saint Petersburg. She had spent almost eleven hours in a police station. She was not detained during last weekend’s violently crushed march of dissent. Ella followed her friend Natalia Evdokimova, the chair of the Human Rights Council of Saint Petersburg, onto a police bus. She told me: “I heard an OMON [the militia of the internal affairs ministry] colonel ordering, “Detain that woman in the red overcoat”. He pointed at Natalia. I immediately rushed to her when she was being taken to the OMON bus.” A few hours later she was charged with resisting the police and participating in an unsanctioned rally.

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Anna Politkovskaya : 1958-2006

October 7th, 2007

Just before my last trip to Chechnya in mid-September my colleagues at Novaya gazeta began receiving threats and were told to pass on the message: I shouldn’t go to Chechnya any more, they said, because if I did my life would be in danger. As always, our paper has its “own people” in the General Staff and the Ministry of Defence – I mean those who shares similar views to our own. We spoke to people at the ministry but, despite their advice, I did go back to Chechnya, only to find myself blockaded in the capital, Grozny. The city was sealed off after a series of strange events there. Controls were so tight you couldn’t even move between different districts within the city, let alone make your way out of Grozny on foot. On that day, 17 September, a helicopter carrying a commission, headed by Major-General Anatoly Pozdnyakov, from the General Staff in Moscow was shot down directly over the city. The general was engaged in work quite unprecedented for a soldier in Chechnya. (more…)

Who are the authorities fighting?

September 26th, 2007

The recent developments into investigations of Russian journalists’ murders, the attempts to accuse publicists and writers in extremism and other crimes along with Duma’s legislation activities, prompts the thought that the major task of Russian authorities is to fight against media and writers, rather then criminals.

On 12 September, Kommersant reported that the prosecutor’s office of Moscow Central Administrative District closed the criminal investigation into the March death of Kommersant defense correspondent Ivan Safronov because of ‘an absence of foul play’.

Safronov threw himself out of the staircase window in his apartment building without any obvious reason: he had a successful career and happy family life. He was a respected military correspondent who often covered sensitive issues in the fields of defence, army and space. The prosecutors opened a criminal case on ‘incitement to suicide’, but failed to find either those who may have prompted the journalist to commit suicide, or any personal motives for taking his own life. At the same time, according to Kommersant’s deputy editor, Iliya Bulavinov, investigators totally neglected the possibility of work-related inducement to suicide, and the case was not fully investigated.

On 27 August, the Prosecutor General Yuri Chaika claimed the arrest of 10 suspects into the prominent investigative reporter from Novaya gazeta, Anna Politkovskaya. Four of the suspects have been charged. Chaika also reported that besides the members of a criminal gang, some current and former police and Federal Security Service officers helped organising the murder. The reports brought some hope to the murdered journalists’ families and colleagues, as this was the first more or less effective investigation following around 47 murders of journalists in Russia since 1992, considered work-related.

However, in the two days following Chaika’s report, two former policemen, suspects in Politkovskaya’s murder, were released. Moreover, the prosecutor’s statement on the masterminds of the murder seriously confused the journalist’s colleagues. Novaya gazeta’s Roman Shleinov reported that the Prosecutor General ‘repeated almost word for word a statement President Vladimir Putin made in the immediate aftermath of Politkovskaya’s murder, blaming forces outside Russia for attempting to undermine the current situation in the country.’ For Novaya gazeta’s journalists this was a sign that any further investigation would be politically influenced.

Politicised murders are very hard to investigate, given the high level of corruption in Russian law enforcement agencies. Nevertheless, some serious cases are actually investigated, although the investigations rarely lead to charges.

In June 2004, well-known St Petersburg journalist Maksim Maksimov disappeared. The investigators managed to find and arrest the suspects. Two witnesses provided a full description of Maksimov’s murder, and others added details. The story appeared in local and international media many times. But since the suspects were experienced officers from the corruption division of Internal Affairs Ministry, the prosecutors had trouble bringing them to justice. The formal reason for this is the fact that journalist’s body was never found. Meanwhile, unofficial sources says, the suspected officers boast that they have high-ranked patrons who will soon help them to get free.

Yet, Manana Aslamazyan, the head of the Educated Media Foundation, the organisation which provided professional training for Russian journalists, after mistakenly violating the administrative code, was branded a criminal right away. The foundation was shut down. In Nizhny Novgorod police confiscated all Novaya Gazeta’s computers ‘to check for unlicensed software’; Krasnodar prosecutors found ‘signs of extremism’ in the books of respected political scientist Andrey Piontkovsky; Moscow prosecutors threatened the lawyer and writer Pavel Astakhov with a libel case, because Astakhov had described corrupt Russian policemen in his novel. The well-known historian and journalist Vladimir Pribylovsky is suspected of extremism. The celebrated satirist Victor Shenderovich is suspected of inciting ethnic and national hatred. When someone shot at Moscow investigative reporter Andrey Kalitin, police refused to open a criminal case based on murder attempt, insisting that this was just a case of hooliganism.

The state Duma seems to support these developments. The parliament’s lower chamber is ready to consider a new bill that bans mentioning the nationality and religion of crimes and their victims. Rather then beating nationalism and extremism, this law will obviously hamper spreading the information on hate crimes and nationalism in Russia. The previous Duma’s anti-extremism amendments gave the law enforcement agencies more opportunities to silence journalists and suspend media.

Investigating contract-style murders, disappearances, and motiveless suicides, is certainly much more difficult then bringing libel cases and catching journalists and educators red-handed for rules violations. Hopefully, the new government, which is meant to fight corruption, and the next parliament, will at least change the priorities in the work of law enforcement agencies. Otherwise, when it comes to the journalists and writers, this work looks more like witch-hunting than fighting with criminals.

New press laws signal censorship

July 10th, 2007

‘If I see you’re involved in self-censorship, or covering up information, I’ll fire you myself!,’ Alexei Venediktov, editor-in-chief of Ekho Moskvy, the independent Russian radio station, tells his staff at a meeting discussing the current media climate in Russia. Ekho Moskvy, one of the few remaining independent media outlets in the country, is well known for its sharp criticism of the Russian government. A number of its journalists are former TV celebrities who came to the company from the independent television channel TVS, which shut down in 2003.

Sergey Dorenko, Evgeny Kiselyev, Svetlana Sorokina, and Victor Shenderovich used to host some of the most popular political shows on Russian TV. They often presented strong criticism of governmental policies, and of the president. But back in the 90s, before Putin, the political climate in Russia was different. Now their programmes on Ekho Moskvy face the threat of stronger censorship.

On 11 July, the Russian parliament adopted amendments designed to intensify the fight against ‘extremism’. The new bill ‘bans the spread of extremist materials, their production, and storage for distribution purposes on the territory of the Russian Federation’. The maximum fine for ‘mass distribution of extremist materials’ is 15 days imprisonment and a fine of 3,000 rubles ($116 US) for ordinary citizens, 5,000 rubles (US $195) for officials, and 100,000 rubles (US $3 890) for companies.

If, as expected, the parliament and the president approve the bill later this year, all media outlets will be responsible for circulating information on closed or outlawed public organisations and groups: when mentioning them, reporters will have to indicate the fact that these organisations have been banned or shut down. List of public and religious organisations that have been closed down or outlawed will be posted on the Internet and published in the media.

The bill includes very broad definitions of the term ‘extremism’, complementing the previous version. Besides the old definitions of extremism as national, racial, social, ideological, or political hatred, it could now be considered extremist to publicly approve of any action preventing citizens from exercising their right to vote and participate in elections. This means that no one would be allowed to call for a boycott of elections.

‘They’ve tightened [legislation] to such an extent that it is now almost impossible to differentiate between extremist statements and ordinary controversy, political argument or criticism of the state,’ Gennady Gudkov, State Duma Security Committee member and retired Federal Security Service colonel, told Ekho Moskvy on 5 July. ‘It’s all left up to the official, the judge, or the prosecutor.’

‘Now, in order to suspend some “unlikable” [disobedient from the authorities’ point of view] media, one will have to exert much less effort then before,’ Maria Kitaichik, a lawyer from St Petersburg, says. ‘It will be enough just to assume that the media distributed deliberately false information; criminal procedure on libel against journalists or media companies won’t be necessary any more.’

A couple of months ago, Ekho Moskvy started receiving letters from prosecutors and security services. Authorities were concerned about broadcasted interviews with Garry Kasparov and Eduard Limonov, the leaders of oppositional, pro-democracy coalition Other Russia, and about the commentaries of Yulia Latynina, a well-known critic of the Kremlin from Ekho Moskvy.

The bill also includes provisions for security services to tap telephone conversations in the event of suspicion of a broad range of crimes. Until now, this power only pertained to suspicion of the most serious of crimes.

This is not the first time the government had introduced Draconian measures to combat ‘extremism’. Last year, it adopted laws which meant that slandering a government official could be treated as extremism, although a court must first rule on the statements in question. The law also criminalised the creation and/or distribution of taped or printed material deemed extremist.

Russian Internet daily Gazeta.ru has reported that the parliament deputies of United Russia, the major party in the State Duma, were told that after the parliamentary summer vacations they are to propose more anti-extremism law amendments.

According to the Moscow based NGO Media Law and Policy Institute, Russia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova, and Tajikistan are the only states in the world currently exercising this type of legislation.

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Russia: Freedom report hits raw nerve

May 8th, 2007

Freedom House’s annual report Freedom of the Press, released last month, caused an outcry over the state of local media in Russia. Freedom House, a leading American civil rights watch-dog, put Russia on 164th place among 195 countries, and named the country “Not Free”. International press-freedom groups supported this evaluation: according to New-York based Committee to Protect Journalists, Russia is the second most dangerous country for journalists; Reporters without borders say that this country is 147th among 168 states, in terms of press freedom.

On 3 May, Koïchiro Matsuura, UNESCO’s Director-General, accused Russian authorities for the growing number of journalists’ murders and impunity, in the conference speech in Medellin, Colombia. Terry Davis, Secretary General of the Council of Europe released an accusatory statement on human rights suppression in Russia, highlighting the unsolved murder of the prominent journalist Anna Politkovskaya.

In response, the local officials and pro-Kremlin experts are persistently reminding that Russian journalists and authorities do not need any evaluation from the outside world to serve the public’s needs.

On the same day, Elena Zelinskaya, the vice-president of Media Union, (a Russian NGO uniting and supporting local media companies), and deputy chair at the Public Chamber’s Committee for Communications, Information Policies and Press Freedom, told the independent radio station Ekho Moskvy about a new project, Index of Press Freedom. The Russian Public Chamber and Public Opinion Research Center (VCIOM) will study the situation in the local media. The project participants are still to define the methods for this research, but Zelinskaya mentioned the economical level of each Russian region, the quality of journalists’ education, and regional practice of the rule of law as the criteria for such evaluation. ‘It seems to us that the evaluations that any foreign organization offers, are mostly based on the opinions… the experts’ views,’ Zelinskaya says. ‘We would like to use facts for our analysis. Our task is to understand what is going on in our country.’ According to Zelinskaya, the Public Chamber must ‘control’ press freedom in Russia, and the project aims to reveal the factors that influence freedom in media.

Anatly Kucherena, the chairman of Public Chamber’s Committee for Public Control over the law enforcement agencies, and the leader of Civil Society public movement, told Russian newspaper Kommersant daily that on Monday, May 7, he would send papers to Brussels for registering the new Association of human rights organisations. Human rights activists from Belgium, Germany, Austria, Italy, USA will participate in this association, which ‘will monitor civil freedoms in the West and prepare ratings, similar to those, where Russia is represented as an outsider.’

Denis Dragunsky, the editor of political journal Kosmopolis, says: ‘Russian press is obviously less free then in Finland and Sweden, for instance, but Russia is a European country, observing human rights and freedoms.’

Boris Reznik, the deputy chairman of the State Duma Committee for Informational Policies, told the local media that he was sceptical ‘such ratings’. ‘It is not clear what criteria are used for these reports,’ Reznik said. ‘At the same time, we should recognize that we are not totally successful in press freedom development. But the question is whether the journalists themselves need freedom. Today many media companies refuse to be free voluntarily. It is easier for them to be obedient.’

The majority of Russian journalists though believe that the local media is heavily censored. The Guild of Press Publishers, a nonprofit partnership of Russian publishers of printed media and industry suppliers, conducted a survey titled Media Market and the Prospects of Civil Society in Russia, which showed that around 70% of Russian journalists recognize the fact of censorship of the local media. Initially, the research aimed to prove that since Perestroika (Mikhail Gorbachev’s liberal reforms) started, Russian media transformed from propaganda into the true reporting, but the polls do not support this hypothesis. Virtually all Russian journalists deny the existence of press freedom in Russia. As for the public, only 27% of Russian citizens trust local media.

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