Attacks on the Press 2006: Russia
RUSSIA As Russia assumed a world leadership role, chairing the Group of Eight leading industrialized nations and the Council of Europe’s powerful committee of ministers, the Kremlin cracked down on dissent and shrugged off astounding attacks on critics and journalists. In a grim year for the press, parliament passed a measure to hush media criticism…
Independent journalist kidnapped in Chechnya
New York, August 21, 2006—The Committee to Protect Journalists is concerned about the fate of reporter Elina Ersenoyeva, who was seized by masked men in the southern Russian republic of Chechnya on Thursday. Ersenoyeva is Grozny correspondent for the independent weekly Chechenskoye Obshchestvo (Chechen Society), which is based in neighboring Ingushetia.
Attacks on the Press 2005: Russia
RUSSIA President Vladimir Putin and his allies continued to expand control over the media, using methods that critics called reminiscent of the Soviet era. Journalists who took on powerful political or business interests sometimes paid with their lives. Two journalists were killed in 2005 for their reporting. In the five years since Putin took power,…
CPJ calls on minister to reverse ABC decision
Dear Minister Lavrov: The Committee to Protect Journalists is alarmed by the Foreign Ministry’s pattern of using accreditation, visa and other regulations to control and intimidate journalists reporting on the war in Chechnya for foreign media. The Foreign Ministry escalated this campaign against foreign news media by moving this week to bar the U.S. television network ABC from reporting in Russia.
Attacks on the Press 2004: Russia
RussiaA midyear purge of independent voices on state television and an alarming suppression of news coverage during the Beslan hostage crisis marked a year in which Russian President Vladimir Putin increasingly exerted Soviet-style control over the media. Using intelligence agents and an array of politicized state agencies, Putin pushed for an obedient and patriotic press…
CPJ urges Bush to highlight Russian press abuses in Putin summit
Dear President Bush: The Committee to Protect Journalists is extremely concerned about the dramatic decline in press freedom under Russian President Vladimir Putin’s tenure, including a recent surge in new media restrictions spearheaded by the Kremlin and its allies.
CPJ calls on Putin to end harassment of Chechen newspaper
New York, July 29, 2004—The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) calls on Russian President Vladimir Putin to ensure that government officials in the southern republics of Ingushetia and Chechnya end their campaign of harassment against the independent weekly Chechenskoye Obshchestvo (Chechen Society), which is based in Ingushetia’s capital, Nazran. According to Chechenskoye Obshchestvo Editor Timur…
Attacks on the Press 2003: Europe and Central Asia Analysis
While integration into NATO and the European Union has had a positive effect on press freedom conditions in most of Central Europe and the Baltic states, the situation for journalists in Russia and the former Soviet republics has worsened steadily, with governments relying on authoritarian tactics to silence the media. Even reformist governments in the…
Attacks on the Press 2003: Russia
Russian president Vladimir Putin and his coterie of former intelligence officials pressed ahead in 2003 with his vision of a “dictatorship of the law” in Russia to create a “managed democracy.” Putin’s goal of an obedient and patriotic press meant that the Kremlin continued using various branches of the politicized state bureaucracy to rein in…