Journalists must be shot dead
Vladimir Putin, Photo DPA
MOSCOW – A Russian human rights lawyer renowned for his work on abuses in Chechnya was shot to death Monday by a masked gunman who followed him from a news conference. A young journalist who tried to intervene also was shot.
Murder
The broad-daylight shootings of lawyer Stanislav Markelov and journalist Anastasia Baburova prompted grief and outrage in a country where lawyers and journalists who challenge the official version of justice are frequently targeted.
Colleagues drew comparisons with the 2006 killing of investigative journalist Anna Politkovskaya — a client of Markelov’s and a fellow enemy of rights abuses in Chechnya and across former President Vladimir Putin’s Russia.
Markelov, 34, was shot near a building where he had just held a news conference, about half a mile (1 kilometer) from the Kremlin.
Markelov was shot in the back of the head at close range by an attacker who followed him after the news conference, wore a stocking-style mask and had a silencer on his gun — clear signs of a planned killing, state-run RIA-Novosti news agency reported.
Fatal intervention
(Specifics of russian national mentality would not let person stay cowardly passive toward unknown offenders in the street)
Anastasia Baburova, a freelance journalist in her mid-20s who had worked for the Novaya Gazeta newspaper, was shot when she tried to intervene after Markelov was attacked. Another Novaya Gazeta editor, Sergei Sokolov, later said she died on an operating table.
Markelov, who represented the family of the 18-year-old Chechen woman killed by Col. Yuri Budanov in 2000, had told reporters he was considering filing an international court appeal against Budanov’s early release, the RIA-Novosti news agency reported.
Freedom of speech in Russia
Russia is considered to be one of the most dangerous places in the world for journalists to work.
The situation gained worldwide attention two years ago after the murder of Anna Politkovskaya, a reporter who was fatally gunned down while investigating the victims of the Russian war in Chechnya.
The Glastnost Defense Foundation, which provides legal support to the media in Russia, estimates that more than 220 journalists have been killed in Russia since 1991.
Of those deaths, only six have been «properly investigated,» according to the foundation. «They don’t think journalists are really useful in this country,» said the foundation’s president Alexei Simonov, referring to Russian authorities. «Sometimes they even think they’re worse than useless.»
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