List of Journalists Killed in Russia - Concern Abroad

Concern Abroad

Over the past decade the Russian authorities have been repeatedly urged, by Western governments and international media bodies, to do more to investigate the deaths of journalists there. The Paris-based Reporters Without Borders constantly criticized Russia for what it described as a failure to investigate these murders . The organization further claimed that many of the dead journalists had been critical of the Russian President, Vladimir Putin. Between March 2000 and July 2007, said Reporters Without Borders, 21 journalists were murdered in Russia because of their work.

Similar figures were produced by the CPJ. In a June 2007 statement the CPJ said, "A total of 47 journalists have been killed in Russia since 1992, with the vast majority of killings unsolved,". Seventeen of these journalists had been killed "in the line of duty" since 2000: 14 were murdered in retaliation for their journalism; "two died in crossfire; and one was killed while covering a dangerous assignment". The CPJ was continuing to investigate the deaths of eight other journalists to see if there was a link with their work. None of the 14 murders committed since 2000 had been solved, the CPJ said, and "13 bear the marks of contract hits".

Pressure on the Russian authorities increased in late 2006 after the murder of Anna Politkovskaya. In June 2007 the board of the World Association of Newspapers passed a resolution, calling on the authorities in Russia to "investigate journalist deaths more vigorously":

The brutal murder on 7 October 2006 of Novaya Gazeta journalist Anna Politkovskaya, known for her critical reporting on the conflict in Chechnya in which she sought to expose human rights abuses, was yet another reminder to Russian journalists that violence awaits those who investigate or criticise. It is estimated that 21 journalists have been killed since Russian President Vladimir Putin came to power in March 2000. In the great majority of cases, no one has been convicted and sentenced for the murders.

On 18 June 2007, the U.S. House of Representatives passed House Resolution 151, calling on Putin to "step-up efforts to investigate" the murders. In a report published in 2007, the International News Safety Institute said more journalists had died violent deaths in Russia in the previous 10 years than anywhere in the world apart from Iraq, though it offered statistics rather than details of the individual victims. The website of the British New Statesman magazine, in what was described as "solidarity with the dead, and in association with Amnesty International, Center for Journalism in Extreme Situations, the Committee to Protect Journalists and Index on Censorship" published a list of 40 Russian journalists killed since 1993, representing only some of those who died.