Russian authorities have decided to reopen the investigation into the murder of Dagestani journalist Akhmednabi Akhmednabiyev. The investigation, launched after the journalist’s shooting in July 2013, was suspended in the summer of 2014. Local authorities failed to identify the perpetrators or instigators, effectively ensuring impunity for his killing. Akhmednabiyev, a reporter for online news...
Kremlin-controlled authorities in Crimea should stop harassing the independent regional broadcaster ATR and allow the outlet to cover the news free from reprisal, the Committee to Protect Journalists said Wednesday. ATR is the only regional broadcaster of the ethnic Crimean Tatar minority. The Simferopol-based anti-extremism department of Crimea's interior ministry sent a letter to the independent...
The International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) and the European Federation of Journalists (EFJ) have joined calls for a thorough and immediate investigation to be carried out into an attack on a BBC news team in the southern Russian city of Astrakhan. According to the BBC, the team was in the city to investigate reports of Russian servicemen being killed near the border with Ukraine. They were...
Independent reporter and blogger Elizaveta Bogutskaya has fled Crimea after authorities in the peninsula raided her home on Monday, confiscated notebooks and other reporting equipment, and detained Bogutskaya for six hours over allegations of extremist activity, according to news reports. "We call on authorities to allow Elizaveta Bogutskaya and all independent journalists to live and work in the...
The International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) and the European Federation of Journalists (EFJ) have called on Russian authorities to carry out an immediate and thorough investigation into the circumstances surrounding the death of journalist Timur Kuashev. According to IFJ affiliate, the Russian Union of Journalists (RUJ), Kuashev, 26, a special correspondent for Russia’s Dosh Magazine and...
Police should carry out a prompt, impartial, and thorough investigation into the death of an independent journalist in Russia’s North Caucasus, Human Rights Watch said Monday. Timur Kuashev, a freelance journalist and rights activist, was found dead in the outskirts of Nalchik, the capital of Kabardino-Balkaria, on August 1, 2014. His friends and colleagues told Human Rights Watch they strongly...
President Vladimir Putin signed into law on July 21, 2014 a series of amendments banning commercial advertising on paid cable and satellite television channels, Human Rights Watch said today. The law unnecessarily interferes with the right to freedom of expression and should be repealed, Human Rights Watch said. The new amendments to the federal law “On Advertising†bans cable and satellite...
The International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) and the European Federation of Journalists (EFJ) have called for Russian authorities to ensure that Ukrainian journalist Yevgeny Agarkov is immediately released following his prolonged and disproportionate period in detention. According to IFJ affiliates the National Union of the Journalists of Ukraine (NUJU) and the Independent Media Trade Union...
The Russian parliament should remove from consideration proposed amendments to the media law that would require foreign-funded media outlets that cover “political activities†to register as “foreign agents.†The draft amendments mirror the 2012 law that requires nongovernmental advocacy organizations to register as “foreign agents.†This law has been the centerpiece of the Kremlin’s...
The International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) and the European Federation of Journalists (EFJ) have welcomed the convictions of the murderers of the journalist Anna Politkovskaya, but they have urged Russian authorities to continue their investigations and to find those people who ordered the killing. On Tuesday, 20 May, a Moscow court found five men guilty of murdering Politkovskaya, a...
