Yeltsin fails to punish journalists’ murderers

Although Boris Yeltsin won the Russian presidential elections, the Russian media --which opted unabashedly to back the president--may have lost.

Paradoxically, while the independent media have thrived under Yeltsin in many ways--to the point where lionizing the president was considered a free editorial decision--the press has suffered its most violent attacks in decades. CPJ has confirmed that 13 journalists have been assassinated since 1994, and four are missing and presumed dead, making Russia one of the most dangerous countries in the world for journalists. Through his government’s failure to fully investigate, let alone prosecute, these cases, Yeltsin has signaled that reporters may be killed with impunity.

These attacks do not necessarily emanate from the president’s office, but stem from his historical lack of control over the "power ministries" (army, police, and security), and from the ministries’ failure, in turn, to control violent groups in society. The much ballyhooed "clean sweep" of corrupt ministries by new security chief Gen. Alexander Lebed is no substitute for the institutionalized watchdog function of a free press. Nor does it address the dangers faced by journalists who probe topics like corruption in the army or in business. In 1996 alone, three journalists were gunned down in or near their homes, and three were assassinated in Chechnya. Several more were brutally beaten, and others narrowly escaped assaults or were threatened.

In 1995, RUFA correspondent Natalya Alyakina was shot by a Russian soldier after being waved through an army checkpoint during a Chechen hostage crisis. Following a bungled investigation, the soldier received a suspended two-year jail sentence for "involuntary manslaughter through negligent use of a weapon." Yeltsin and other high officials failed to make good on their highly publicized promises to see justice done.

In March of this year, Nadezhda Chaikova, a prominent Obshchaya Gazeta  war correspondent known for her exposés of Russian military atrocities and her close contacts with the Chechen resistance, was found murdered execution-style in a Chechen village. Russian federal troops are suspects, but Chechen leaders themselves may have ordered her death, believing she was a spy and acting on rumors spread by the KGB’s successor, the Federal Security Service (FSB).

Many journalists confirm the FSB’s role in discrediting those who report on Chechnya or other security-related topics. Summonses for "chats" at the FSB and invitations to collaborate--or face career difficulties--are still a fact of life, which journalists fear publicizing. One reporter, for instance, was warned to stop covering a controversial story "or else your personal security cannot be guaranteed."

The military is notorious for pressuring journalists. Izvestia  correspondents have been coerced to "share information" with military prosecutors and other authorities. Editors at the feisty Moskovsky Komsomolets have yet to make public their allegations about the murder of fellow reporter Dmitry Kholodov, killed by an exploding briefcase in 1994 while following up on a tip about army corruption. And Juliya Kalinina, another journalist from the same paper, recently received anonymous threats for reporting on military officers’ abuse of power.

So it is not surprising that journalists have greeted Lebed’s personnel purges with skepticism. Without the prosecution of reporters’ attackers, and a credible guarantee of safety from law-enforcement officials, journalists in Russia will not be free to provide the kind of probes into official corruption so necessary to a democratic society. Those in government who stand aside while reporters are killed with impunity cannot be credited with sincerely addressing the crisis facing Russia today.