OSCE media freedom representative warns of spiralling violence against journalists in Russia, urges government to act
VIENNA, 23 January 2008 - The OSCE Representative on Freedom of the Media, Miklos Haraszti, said today he had called on the President and the Prime Minister of Russia to undertake a resolute and vocal effort to protect journalists' physical security.
"The tendency to resort to physical intimidation of journalists resumed in the last months of 2008. I am saddened to see that this trend has intensified in 2009," Haraszti wrote in a letter sent this week to Russia's President Dmitry Medvedev and Prime Minister Vladimir Putin.
In the letter, Haraszti listed the most recent cases, including:
- On 19 January, Novaya Gazeta stringer Anastasia Baburova died from gunshot wounds, shortly after she was shot in downtown Moscow along with human rights lawyer Stanislav Markelov. Markelov had represented the interests of other journalist victims, including Mikhail Beketov and the late Anna Politkovskaya.
- Shafik Amrakhov, an independent Murmansk-based editor and journalist, died 6 January after being shot in the head at close range with rubber bullets in December.
- A fire destroyed the office of opposition newspaper Arsenievskie Vesti in Primorskiy Kray on 3 January, resulting in the death of an employee.
- Regnum correspondent Zhanna Akbasheva was beaten by two men on 23 December 2008. The assailants ordered Akbasheva to stop writing about local officials.
- During the December 2008 demonstrations in Vladivostok, journalists working for at least seven Russian and foreign media outlets were detained along with hundreds of demonstrators. Several journalists suffered injuries from the hands of riot police.
- Numerous journalists were detained during the latest "March of the Discontented" in Moscow on 17 December.
Haraszti called for concerted, centralized government action in order to resolve what he called a "chronic human rights crisis".
"Freedom of the media remains an empty assurance in any country where journalists who discuss important issues are being killed and their murderers remain unpunished.
This is why vocal action on the highest level is urgently needed, in addition to the swift and thorough investigations, not all of which have yet begun," Haraszti said.
Haraszti concluded by expressing his condolences to the families of the victims.