MOSCOW -- More than 80 journalists have been murdered for their work in Russia since 1993, the world's largest journalists' organization said Monday.
Of 289 journalists killed in Russia over the last 14 years, "more than 80 of the deaths resulted from the work the journalists were doing directly," said John Crowfoot, researcher at the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ).
Speaking at the start of a week-long IFJ conference in Moscow, Crowfoot presented the results of a comprehensive database on journalists' deaths in Russia, compiled jointly with the Glasnost Defense Foundation and the Committee for Journalism in Extreme Situations.
The estimate was significantly higher than that of the New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), which lists 44 journalists killed for their work in Russia since 1991.
The estimate by IFJ, which launched its project after the assassination of investigative journalist and Kremlin critic Anna Politkovskya in October, includes murders considered likely to be connected to a reporter's work, a broader standard than CPJ's.
Speaking of the Politkovskaya murder, her former editor Dmitry Muratov told the conference he was "increasingly worried" that the probe into the case was being driven by political considerations.
The magazine Politkovskaya worked for, Novaya Gazeta, said Monday that it suspected that two top Chechen officials ordered her killing.
"We have serious suspicions, but they need to be confirmed," the paper's deputy editor-in-chief, Sergei Sokolov, said.
"They are not minor civil servants, or simple merchants, or official underlings. They are very important men," he added while declining to reveal further details, saying the matter "for the moment" remained with the prosecutor general.
IFJ general secretary Aidan White said that both the Kremlin and the prosecutor general's office had declined invitations to send representatives to the conference.
The Kremlin's decision not to attend "shows an arrogance and intolerance that is unacceptable and needs to be addressed," he added.
Moscow's mayor Yury Luzhkov and Sergei Mironov, speaker of the Federation Council, Russia's upper house of parliament, were set to address the conference Tuesday.
