Putin decries journalist's murder...and her journalism

[Che Guava]

It was almost better when he wasn't saying anything at all...

Putin decries journalist's slaying and reporting

MOSCOW — As mourners buried investigative journalist Anna Politkovskaya on Tuesday, President Vladimir Putin, the target of much of her criticism, condemned both her slaying and her reporting, suggesting her death may have been ordered by exiles to make Russia look bad.

At Politkovskaya's funeral, attended by close to 1,000 mourners, sadness seemed tinged with a broader sense of discouragement for Russia's political future.

"Who is next? This is the question asked today by thousands of journalists, human-rights activists, liberal politicians and progressive people in general," Yuri Chernichenko, deputy chairman of the Moscow Union of Writers, said after the funeral service. "The answer is we don't know. But we know that this is not the first and not the last funeral after which we will be asking that question."

Many who gathered on a cold and drizzly day at a Soviet-era funeral hall in suburban Moscow praised Politkovskaya's courage and concern for the unfortunate.

"I heard that Anna Politkovskaya was on a list of 'enemies of Russia.' But it's obvious that she ... was a real patriot, and she died for the truth," said Eduard Sagalayev, head of the Association of Independent Broadcasters.

Speaking at a news conference during a visit to Dresden, Germany, Putin called the Novaya Gazeta reporter's contract-style slaying Saturday "a crime of loathsome brutality." But he drew the ire of Politkovskaya's admirers when he also portrayed himself as a victim and implied her articles had damaged Russia.

"This murder has done more damage to Russia — and the current authorities of Russia and Chechnya, which she has been covering lately in her work — than Politkovskaya's articles," Putin said, in remarks broadcast on state-run television.

"Putin said an outrageous thing today about Anna," Sergei Sokolov, deputy editor-in-chief of Novaya Gazeta, said of Putin's remarks. "What he said today is so outrageous that it is unworthy of a man, and it is unworthy of the president of Russia."

Putin also appeared to endorse the idea, promoted since Sunday by pro-Kremlin media, that advocates of a Ukrainian-style "Orange Revolution" had ordered Politkovskaya's killing to advance their cause. Her admirers have described that theory as ridiculous and offensive.

Politkovskaya, 48, was best known for her reporting on human-rights abuses in war-torn Chechnya. She was killed in her apartment building by gunshots to the chest and head after a Saturday afternoon shopping trip.

A large majority of those who came to the funeral were middle-aged or elderly, representing a generation that had placed great faith in democracy during the waning years of the Soviet Union and the first few years after its 1991 collapse. Mourners filed past her open casket, setting down long-stemmed roses, carnations and other flowers.

In Dresden, at a meeting with the St. Petersburg Dialogue Forum, Putin declared that the murder of Politkovskaya and the 2004 killing in Moscow of Paul Klebnikov, the American editor of Forbes magazine's Russian-language edition, may have been intended to provoke anti-Russian sentiment in other countries, the Russian news agency Interfax reported.

 

[Masquerouge]

I did not expect something else from him. A very machiavellian move.

 

[Rambuchan]

Got a link to source Che?

Here's another angle on the same story...

Chechen strongman denies killing Russian reporter

MOSCOW (Reuters) - Chechnya's Prime Minister Ramzan Kadyrov said on Wednesday he did not order the murder of Anna Politkovskaya, the Russian journalist who wrote articles alleging he was behind brutal rights abuses.

"Chechens do not go in for violently settling scores, certainly not with women. And she was a woman ... I do not kill women and I have never killed women," Kadyrov, 30, said in comments broadcast by NTV television.

"As for Anna Politkovskaya, at the end of the day she did not get in my way ... I think the people who ordered her killing did it once again to blacken my name."

The contract-style murder of Politkovskaya on the staircase of her Moscow apartment on Saturday drew international condemnation. Police say her killing was probably linked to her work. Critics accused the Kremlin of failing to protect freedom of speech.

Politkovskaya was scathingly critical of Russian President Vladimir Putin and the Kremlin's conduct of an anti-separatist war in Chechnya. Kadyrov's pro-Moscow militia -- known as the 'Kadyrovtsy' -- was a regular target of her writing.

The Novaya Gazeta newspaper, where mother-of-two Politkovskaya worked, said it believed her murder was linked to Kadyrov: either an attempt to silence his most vocal critic or a ploy by his rivals to discredit him.

In a September 11 article, Politkovskaya wrote: "In Chechnya the 'Kadyrovtsy' beat men and women ... and cut the throats of their enemies."

Human rights groups say Kadyrov's forces effectively run Chechnya on the Kremlin's behalf and are behind frequent abductions and killings. Kadyrov has denied the accusations.

Reuters Source.

Also, there's this contract killer murder and a whole load of others to boot...

Russian bank manager is shot dead

A Russian bank manager has been gunned down at his home in Moscow in an apparent contract killing.

Alexander Plokhin was shot in the head as he came out of the lift in his apartment building late on Tuesday. He was the manager of the southern Moscow branch of the state-owned Vneshtorgbank.

His murder follows the high-profile killing of the journalist Anna Politkovskaya, and the assassination of a Russian central banker. Moscow's prosecutor's office said the attack on Mr Plokhin had the tell-tale signs of a contract killing.

He worked recently as director-general of the external office of Vneshtorgbank 24, Russian TV reports.

It follows the death last month of the first deputy chairman of Russia's central bank, Andrei Kozlov, who was leading a fight against money laundering. He was shot by two unidentified gunmen in Moscow.

Murder rate

Mr Plokhin's death also comes the day after the funeral of investigative journalist Anna Politkovskaya, who was shot dead on Saturday. The journalist was a consistent critic of Russian President Vladimir Putin and one of the most outspoken opponents of the conduct of the war in Chechnya.

Contract killings were common amid the general lawlessness that prevailed in Russia in the early 1990s, says the BBC's Russian affairs analyst Steven Eke. But they seemed to taper off when Mr Putin came to power, promising a crackdown on crime.

However, Russia's murder rate remains among the highest in the world, and the clear-up rates for contract killings especially low, at between 10% and 20%.

BBC Source

 

[Che Guava]

Ram: here's the link

 

[Trajan12]

I did not expect something else from him. A very machiavellian move.

Which machiavellian quality would that be?

 

[BaneBlade]

Which machiavellian quality would that be?

It's been a time since i've read him, but ordering a dissenter to get killed, then lie about it and use the act to further my goals strikes me as machiavellian!? What's your angle?

 

[Panda]

AFAIK there's not a shred of evidence connecting the Russian government to the assasination - only the cries of people who believe, among others, 9/11 was a conspiracy by the Bush administration, islam is a religion of peace, and all things evil are a result of the white man's meddlings. If one wants to associate himself with that lot - good night, and good luck.

Who wants Putin to shed crocodile tears anyways?