Anna Politkovskaya’s family is to appeal against a judge’s rejection of its request for the case against three alleged accomplices to be sent back to the prosecutor’s office for further investigation in conjunction with the investigation into all other people suspected of a role in her murder. The family’s request for a postponement for the purposes of combined further investigation was backed by both defence lawyers and prosecutors. Read more here
Akhmed Gisayev, a Memorial employee who had been working with Natalia Estemirova to investigate a sensitive human rights case in the days before her murder in July has experienced a series of menacing events in the past days and weeks. Gisayev, who lives in the Chechen capital, Gronzy, has reported being stopped by armed men in the street, having his flat searched and being under constant surveillance by security services. Read more here
A judge handed down a 31-year prison term to a police officer turned vigilante who abducted and tortured three journalists working for O Dia newspaper, a verdict the Brazilian newspaper described Thursday as “historic.” Former police inspector Odinei Fernandes da Silva, who led a paramilitary group that controlled the Rio de Janeiro slum of Batan, was found guilty of robbery, torture and criminal conspiracy. Read more here
TV journalist Siddique Bacha Khan has been shot dead in the city of Mardan in Pakistan’s restive North West Frontier Province. Unidentified gunmen ambushed Bacha Khan, news correspondent for the independent Aaj TV channel, and shot him at close range before fleeing the scene. The journalist was critically injured and died en route to the hospital, according to Aaj TV and the Pakistan Federal Union of Journalists. Read more here