| Submit your comments on this article |
| Caucasus/Russia/Central Asia |
| CSM: Russia uses KGB playbook on press |
| 2004-09-22 |
| EFL Like scores of her colleagues, Georgian television journalist Nana Lezhava reported on the terrorist school seizure at Beslan. But her coverage ended in arrest by the FSB, Russia's security service once known as the KGB. Tests show she was drugged during interrogation - one of several incidents that are raising questions about Russian handling of the media. No further information is provided about the tests that corroborate the drugging of the Georgian journalist. Officials have acknowledged deliberately downplaying hostage and casualty numbers. A top newspaper editor in Moscow has been fired for "emotional" coverage; even one of Russia's state-controlled TV broadcasters has complained of lack of truth. And two known Kremlin critics were prevented from reaching Beslan at all, by KGB-style methods. "When Nana was interrogated by FSB officials, she was offered a cup of coffee," says Tudu Kurtgelia, head of news for Georgia's Rustavi-2 TV. "She was told they added some cognac to the coffee and she lost her senses. She doesn't remember anything, and only came to a day later, in hospital." The hospital tests should show what she was drugged with if they show she was drugged. Why aren't details provided? Hundreds of miles away, on a flight from Moscow to get to the Beslan hostage scene, journalist Anna Politkovskaya asked for tea from a stewardess. After drinking it she lost consciousness, and upon landing was taken to a hospital. "Somebody did not want me to reach Beslan," says Ms. Politkovskaya, a writer for Novaya Gazeta and frequent critic of Moscow's policy in Chechnya, who - because of her contacts with the relatively "moderate" rebel faction of Aslan Maskhadov - had played a mediating role in a previous siege. In this case, Politkovskaya was on the phone constantly at the airport, perhaps raising official eyebrows as she tried to convince those close to the at-large former Chechen president to intervene in the hostage crisis. "We have old Byzantine traditions to eliminate unwanted people," says Politkovskaya. "Even a hint from a top official to his subordinates is sometimes enough for them to act." [...] more examples of Russian governement clamping down on the media. |
| Posted by:Super Hose |
| #2 Good enough. Russia is officially out of control. Way to go, Vlad. |
| Posted by: badanov 2004-09-22 10:09:55 AM |
| #1 Search for Politkovskaya and Babitsky and you'll get details on them -- I'd heard about them a while ago. http://www.cpj.org/news/2004/Russia03sept04na.html "According to local press reports, police at Vnukovo Airport in Moscow first detained Babitsky yesterday morning on suspicion of carrying explosives. None were found and he was released. Then two young men approached him and tried to start a fight with him, according to radio station Ekho Moskvy. As a result, airport police detained him again, along with the two men. Earlier reports said that Babitsky had been detained because he was âa victim of hooliganism,â but he was actually charged with âhooliganismâ himself and sentenced to five days in jail today. ... According to the Moscow-based Web site Grani.Ru, the two young men who approached Babitsky at the airport yesterday asked him to buy them beer, and when he refused, they started harassing him. At that time, airport police detained all three men at the airport police station for disorderly conduct, where they were kept until 5 p.m. Babitsky said that the two men, who were later identified as airport workers, told him that they were instructed to pick a fight with him, Grani.Ru reported. Babitskyâs lawyer, Vladimir Artemov, has appealed the journalistâs sentence. The guilty verdict was based entirely on the testimony of the Vnukovo Airport police officers, even though their accounts differed from those of other witnesses of the incident. and http://www.mosnews.com/news/2004/09/03/politkovskaya.shtml On 1 September, Anna Politkovskaya boarded a plane bound for Beslan, Dmitry Muratov, Novaya Gazeta editor-in-chief Dmitry Muratov told the NEWSru.com Web-site. During a stopover in Rostov-on-Don she felt unwell and lost consciousness. Diagnosed with food poisoning, she spent the whole day in the Rostov hospital. Her condition is still grave. According to NGâs editor, it all sounds very suspicious since Anna claimed she had not eaten anything for the whole day before landing in Rostov-on-Don, apart from a cup of tea she had on board. In "http://www.guardian .co.uk/comment/story/0,3604,1300193,00.html" Politkovskaya herself says: "All the tests taken at the airport have been destroyed - on orders "from on high", say the doctors. " |
| Posted by: Aris Katsaris 2004-09-22 9:37:40 AM |